Thoughts lately (Dec 2020)

My reading and thinking lately have been circling around this theme of emotional literacy and its adjacent topics

Lately I’ve fallen into this rabbit hole. it started with one cluster, then I stumbled upon new ones and they grew somewhat interlinked

Let me try to unravel them a bit here. Right now I don’t have any specific point or angle, only have a couple of loose clusters or things to digest.

Note: the ones in double-brackets are my local note titles in nvAlt.

About listening and being human in conversations. collaborating through human approach

  • notes on peter boghossian’s “listening” talk, below
  • “don’t interrupt”, nancy kline. why do we rush so much? (only US culture it seems) [[Cultural Dimensions]]
  • johnnie moore: unhurried conversations, on the edge podcast.
    • how and why need to slow down and stop interrupting each other all the time [[resurf]]
    • race to the bottom, the competition for attention, by assuming that what people want is info. controversy works too
    • 4m in: there’s something satisfying to us in sharing our experiences together, not being madly attached to changing other people’s views or improving on their stories, but experiencing what it’s like to be with other people who are surprisingly like us, in a different way, trying to make sense of this stressful confusing amazing experience of life. to feel less alone. a good MOnQ in life: triggering “oh, you too?”
    • 5m in: when we have more relaxed convo, when there’s a bit more sharing of experience and a bit less pressure to prove things, we discover oh we’re not alone in that
    • many layers to this
    • relationships before ideas, conversations are fertile breeding ground for those. trust over transactions
    • the thought of “we need to have brilliant ideas to make connections”. it’s likely the other way around? oh… dia kaitkan dengan personal branding, wwkwkw.
    • we don’t connect through ideas first. we
    • getting our ideas out is one thing. sharing our experiences is another layer (not sure if it’s the deeper or outer, or if that even matter)
    • these unhurried conversations are delicious because everyone is approaching the challenge of making sense of life in their peculiar way, tiny peculiarities. example: someone with spanish accent saying “blimey”
    • feeling like we have no time makes us less human
    • 8:50. unhurried conversations is about taking turn speaking, for as long as they like, about whatever is on their mind, and not be interrupted even if they paused to collect their thoughts, even if they’re saying something very controversial, without the fear of being corrected straight away. aided by a simple device: a talking stick.
      • made me realise I have so much anxiety around speaking. fear of being ignored, being misunderstood, being perceived as inarticulate, ineloquent, being overly self consciousness about repeating myself, or rambling, or boring people out. and the underpinning cause is this culture of rushing.
    • 11m in. we take interrupting and being interrupted for granted, as a standard way of engaging. when that’s not happening, remarkable thing happens. it takes the pressure off, you become more aware of what you’re saying, you hear yourself speak — something you don’t really get to do in normal convos. which funnily fixes the problem of repeating yourself or being long winded. we slow down, we naturally become more succinct and eloquent. // wow, this is the “letting not getting” way of being a better speaker…. interesting…. // so, another MO: collecting modes of “let, not get” for common important activities more people seem to want to get better at. sleeping better, eating better, get active
    • 13m in, about collective IQ, outsourcing or load balancing (yes, this) your thought process with the rest of the people there. you are working things out with others. the thing is between us, not inside us. etymology of the word “intelligence” has something related to “togetherness” (?) to gather between. it’s a relational thing. working things out together, making something between us. not just establishing facts, but experimenting together, in making meaning.
    • 17m in. about organising a book. the right order. fragments. infinite mids, start anywhere. no beginning nor end. but then, book is linear. what about coherent narrative, logical build-ups?
  • celeste headlee’s “let’s do more voice less text”
  • listening to learn (vs to win, and to fix) // Jennifer Garvey Berger

  • why are we in such a hurry these days
    • [[celeste headlee – do nothing]]
    • johnnie moore – unhurried convo
  • having conversations, communicating inefficiently
    • simon terry
    • johnnie moore
    • celeste headlee
    • david gurteen
    • these sensemakers, snowden, sonja siapa? no, helen bevan, yes that’s the person
    • leanness, seth godin’s framing of it (make more mistakes, get to the wins faster. iterate). bureaucracy, JIT JIC. systems that are too lean aren’t resilient
    • asking questions, empathetic, listening well
      • edgar schein
      • [[Naomi Feil – validation]]
      • jennifer garvey berger
      • johnnie moore
      • nancy kline
  • [[senses famine]]. senses deprivation. deliberate or unintentional
    • different from mindfulness // haha, then links to
    • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1GiUa8mVvA # Ground Yourself Using Your Senses
    • our addiction / immersion in/with tech (hooked, “diaper apps”), humanising
      • https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2012/02/does-too-much-computer-time-degrade-social-sk/
    • seeing representation of things we are and want to do
  • emotional literacy
    • flight from emotion // denial
    • people’s discomfort around dealing with other people’s feelings, as well as their own (even more so)
    • we dismiss them, suppress, repress,
    • feeling your feelings
    • [[mandy saligari]]
    • that video from naomi feil
    • words as hooks
    • https://www.bakadesuyo.com/2020/12/emotionally-intelligent-2/
    • permission to feel, marc brackett (first saw some psych account I followed on IG reposting / mentioning brene brown’s podcast episode with him. the title is perfectly timed / relevant)
      • https://web.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=1482147551996539&ref=watch_permalink
      • https://brenebrown.com/transcript/marc-brackett-and-brene/
      • https://www.amazon.com/Permission-Feel-Unlocking-Emotions-Ourselves/dp/1250212847/
  • need [[resurf]], [[don’t hit pause]]
  • better human, not better computer
    • seeing handwriting is precious these days
  • speaking your language (self expression)

// pull these into the commguide? warrant a separate series? not numbered, just a series of themed posts. bite-sized // cheating a bit :p


More themes:
– emotional literacy. denial.
– lean and mean. efficiency fatigue. running too low on fat // [[on hustle fatigue aka burnout]]
– the benefit of speech (and not always text)
– the human experience, art, uncertainty
– [[wholehearted living]]
– more letting, less getting
– [[seeing water]]
– [[identity politics]], cancel culture x disinformation x misinformation, thinking critically
– human nature, seeking certainty, deconstructing, looking for the right path (newbies asking Qs) // [[people watching]]
– now isn’t what was, and isn’t final. things have evolved and will keep evolving

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