A History of Silence

So, to start with my customary thought: I am horrible at blogging. I'm not sure who I do this for, other than myself and maybe a few friends, but oh well. I still enjoy it when I have the time. And if there is any place that ought to give me the time to blog, it is the Peace Village that I am currently staying in for the Images and Voices of Hope 2010 World Summit. While I knew that it was some kind of spiritual retreat location, I had no idea how integrated the reflection and meditation would be with the summit content. Actually pretty cool, if a little hard to describe.

The conference started with a moment of silence. Immediately, I began reflecting on the simple topic of silence, which makes me think of many things from my past. I break these things into two intersecting axes of categories, each with two divisions. On the first axis is scope: personal or communal silence. On the second axis is tone: abrasive or supportive. There are many things that could fall into these categories, but I'm going to reflect only on the ones most pressing in my mind: just one from each group, though it will be hard to choose in some places.

First, personal abrasive silence. A dominant example in this category for me was Catholic church. I absolutely despised the time in which we would get off the pews, kneel down, and be expected to pray on cue. I would stare blankly down at the floor and think about anything that came to mind, but I would very infrequently pray and mostly feel uncomfortable. This is not to say that I never prayed, just that the format didn't appeal to me. I actually developed a dislike of crossing my hands or arms together and bending my head down for a while, for whatever purpose. Playing 7 Up in class was particularly reminiscent of the church prayer experience for me, and subsequently abhorred.

Next, personal supportive silence. Probably the exact opposite of the previous experience; I think here about stargazing. There is something inexplicably personal about this activity for me, even if I am with other people when I do it. Stargazing has been a regular activity since I can remember (even when it was just moongazing when we lived in Queens), and I suspect it is the sense that I am looking outward at something so vast that forces me to reflect on my place in that vastness. To me, that experience is more spiritually inspiring than any church pew. Lumped into this category I would also put other connections with nature: viewing mountains or bodies of water, and laying out on grass during rain storms or sitting on sand dunes. I love all of it, and there is something about the experience of it all that inspires quiet, calm, and contentment.

Third, communal abrasive silence. This is a rare thing and in my opinion extremely uncomfortable. Standing in an elevator with people you don't know and that clearly don't want to talk to you. Riding the bus home with teammates after going to state finals and placing second by just one point. Watching your high school chemistry teacher fume in silent anger after someone eats dry ice. I've broken my rule of only giving one example, probably because these instances of silence are so torturous as to not even bear discussion or deep reflection. They are the moments in which you want desperately to say something, and yet have nothing meaningful to contribute. And you know that everyone else present is likely feeling the same way. It just sucks.

Lastly, communal supportive silence. My favorite. This brings to mind above all else my primary school music programs. I loved the moments when you knew that everyone was thinking the same thing and working towards the same goal without uttering a word. The best songs we sang or played were always the ones that required long pauses, deep silence, and then a gentle step forward together, timed perfectly after months of practice. The most memorable of those moments came while in the Ira Allen Chapel on UVM campus, winning the regional portion of the National High School A Cappella Association's annual competition. There are other events unassociated with music that stick out for me here as well. The prayer circle around our flag pole on September 11th. The moment of silence on my graduation day for the two students that had not lived to see it. Even driving in a car next to someone else and knowing that you are both enjoying the experience without the need to vocalize it. Social moments of positive silence are by far the most refreshing, comforting, simple but perfect versions of peaceful reflection, I think.

Not sure if that should really lead anywhere. These are just some observations from my personal life. While the thought of silence makes me cringe when I think about how quiet I used to be, and that my favorite quote in my high school year book is "Silence is golden," it's actually quite a rich and enjoyable topic to delve into right now... I suspect it will remain that way for years to come, and that the nuances of the topic will only grow in detail.

Growing Ripples

I don't have much to say, except that I'm absolutely thrilled to know that there are people out in the world that I went to high school with, some that I would have never considered close friends by any means, who have donated to the UN project. And others that have found connections to share the story of the project with. It's truly heartwarming to watch those ripples of awareness and support grow and spread. I can only hope that they continue to do so until we have reached our goal of $250,000.

Don't let the ripples die off before it happens!

Many Hands Make the Load Lighter

Just after the crisis in Haiti, I bought a t-shirt from Threadless to donate to the cause. The slogan of the shirt was "Men anpil chay pa lou," which translates to "Many hands make the load lighter." I didn't think much about the phrase at the time, aside from admiring the beauty of such an idea. That idea feels a wee bit more pertinent to me now.

Last week, I almost lost my job. Sort of. Without going into detail, I'll sum up by saying that the project I've given my heart to for almost two full years now may not see the light of day without some serious fundraising. We're talking about $250k of seriousness. That's a big number, but it could come down quickly.

If you're reading this, you probably know me at least a little. Maybe we're not friends that give gifts to each other, and maybe we haven't seen each other in years. But if I bumped into you on the street and asked if you could spare five bucks, would you give it to me? What about just one dollar? Well, I'm bumping into you on a metaphorical street right now. And if you have one, five, ten, whatever dollars to spare, I'd ask you to donate it to my project. Make my project into our project.

You may not have seen the same faces of young boys that I've seen, and you may never have wondered what those boys are being taught by their peers and elders about how to treat a girl and how to love someone. But I hope that you at least believe me when I tell you that they're out there, and that the project I'm working on could give them a chance to question the things they hear, see, adopt, and someday might practice.

If you can't spare that few dollars, or even if you can, perhaps you can instead spare a few minutes. Tell someone else about this project, forward my message, or just share the donation link. It would quite literally mean the world to me.

You can read about the project here, or jump straight to the donation page. Many thanks in advance for your small acts that can make this enormous but powerful load a little lighter.

The Happiness Project

So I've been reading The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, and I think it's made me realize that I've been working on my own happiness project for about a year now. Maybe not as methodical, but perhaps just as effective.

Rubin tackles the task of making herself happier by outlining 12 topics to cover over the course of 1 year: marriage, parenthood, friends, eternity, attitude, work, play, passion, energy, money, and mindfulness. She took on one subject each month, adding to the resolutions from the previous month and leaving the 12th month of the year to juggle all 11 topics.

So far, I've read her first two months/chapters entitled "Boost Energy" and "Remember Love." The first in particular allowed me to notice changes I've made in my own life. I play DDR for an hour and a half on Saturdays and Sundays, half an hour on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and 45 minutes of Wii Fit on Tuesdays and Thursdays (I've lost 5 pounds this month, hopefully that's only the beginning). I make a list of chores to get done on weekends; even if I don't make it through all of them, I still feel accomplished. To clear clutter out of my apartment, I look for something to bring down to the dumpster or the recycling bins with me every morning (and it's gotten to the point where I literally hunt down emptied and useless items). I listen to songs that make me walk faster on my way to and from work. If I feel like singing or dancing to that music, I do (to varying degrees depending upon the presence of other people).

I've also worked a bit on the interpersonal side. I only say no to a social engagement if I'm double-booked, where previously I might hesitate due to the uncertainty of the outcomes. If my family or a friend calls, I call them back as soon as possible instead of waiting for them to check in again in a few weeks. I try to be an initiator and encourager instead of a responder and an agreer. I've stopped accommodating others at the cost of my own mental health - or at least, I don't do it without speaking up a little.

Now I'm following the book and thinking about what my resolutions would be each month. What would this month be? I think boosting energy is more than just physical for me, so it warrants two months of work. What I would call "Feeling Smarter" in a sense, keeping myself actively reflecting, learning, and creating. I've started playing one song on the keyboard every morning, watching one piece of media in Japanese with subtitles at least once a week, and hopefully keeping up with my blog more regularly. Once I have furniture in my apartment again, I'm hoping to get back into pastels on the weekends - I have five small frames I bought to fill with artwork weekly.

Anyway, more important than the details of such a plan is the engagement and determination to do it. I think there are very few people that wouldn't benefit from such an endeavor. Just something to ponder.

Schoolwork, Internship, Apprenticeship, or Ownership

I've just been introduced to an interesting thought regarding my workplace that had never occurred to me before. For anyone reading that is not familiar with the Emergent Media Center's project structure, we hire students for pay to work on projects under the supervision of staff and faculty advisors.

I've always been aware of the fact that this is very different from a classroom experience. In a classroom, the teacher challenges the learner to exercise gains in knowledge through activities that mean little beyond the educational realm; your homework does not profit the teacher in any immediate sense.

This is also different than an internship; while an internship is provided to a learner by a teacher in order to acquire profits and sustain a pool of employees, interns are notoriously buried in menial tasks that are not worth the time and effort of a more skilled worker. This makes for a very long process of gaining knowledge and transforming learner to teacher. Someday, that intern may be the skilled worker laying tedious assignments out onto new interns, but that ladder may be a tall one to climb.

The closest comparison I could come up with is apprenticeships of old; someone would take in a successor to their profession and teach them the craft. This process also allows the teacher a degree of profit based on the learner's progress, and the knowledge gain is steeper. There are no intermediate positions, just a transition from learner to fellow teacher. Still potentially a long process, but more focused on the topic of knowledge gain from the start.

Even this does not suffice to explain the model here at the EMC. Here, teacher and learner both strive for the exact same goals, and may indeed be doing the exact same task. Given how much responsibility for the product is laid in the hands of the learners, one can even argue that the learner's progress, product, and profits become more important than the teacher's. This is not to say that the presence of the teacher is unnecessary or insignificant, but the fruits of the teacher's labor are minimal and sometimes nonexistent.

Having reflected upon this, it truly is fascinating how similar and yet different the dynamics are from classroom to EMC: similar in feeling, but different in realization. While we can only hope that there are never any tremendous failures on the part of our learners, the rewards or consequences of good or bad work have so much more impact than one letter of the alphabet stamped on a paper or inserted into an email. And I think perhaps the teacher's interpretation of the learner's progress is far different. In this space, a major failure can still be an "A moment" if the conclusions and resolutions that come out of that failure express true learning. Here, the process to reach the final product is just as important as what you "turn in" at the end of your time on a project.

The evaluation of a learner's growth is so interdisciplinary here too. Sure, maybe you're a writer, and if this were a classroom environment we would grade you on the script you turn in. But even though you're a writer, we still see and appreciate your communication style and behavior management. You may not be an artist, but we find value in those stick figure storyboards you used to get yourself to the end goal. You didn't have to talk to the programmers, but we admire your choice to learn how your script will be programmed into a game. Teachers don't have the time to observe every moment of work on an assignment in order to grade the process, but aside from it sounding a little creepy, I think our world would see better learners, and ultimately better teachers too, if the entire journey were under examination for praise or critique.

I've digressed a little, but my main point is that I like where I work for all the whos, hows, and whats involved. The process is just as awesomely emergent as all of the products it generates.

Pausing the Game

Yes, it's been a year since I last wrote on my blog. What's happened in my life since then? I'll allow those reading this to guess at what level of change in my life would leave me no time to write about it, though reflection time abounds on my walks to and from the bus stop on Cherry Street every weekday. Here are a few hints. Work. Apartment. Exercise. Sunshine. Friends. Family. Cooking. Cleaning. Spontaneity. Reading. Email. EMAIL.

I am yet again on my way to GDC in a week, but that is not my impetus to write. I feel compelled to write because of a little game that just came out on the Playstation 3 called Heavy Rain. There are a dozen fan-girlish things I could say about the game that thousands of other people would say too. I will take a moment to lay praise on the game for merging cinema with gameplay. From the moment one watches the opening credits, included the "Written and Directed by" line that everyone looks for in a movie and no one ever looks for in a game, the experience read "movie" without reading passive. There were passive elements to it, of course - the cinematic cuts and choices made by unplayable characters, but those elements were so cleverly paralleled with interactive content that I truly felt engaged throughout.

There, praise laid. The point that I want to get to is how this game made me think about the work that I am doing right now with games and attitudinal or behavior change. I am quite certain that Heavy Rain is the closest I've ever come to seeing games evoke an emotional response from the player that is strong enough to drive a change in attitude or behavior. I'm not saying that (SPOILERS!) I've decided I'll never kill a man to save my son or that I'm not going to trust private investigators without doing a thorough background check (END SPOILERS), because the content of the decisions I made are of no interest here. What really struck me was the process of decision making.

Keep in mind that this game took about 10 hours to play through, and there was no traditional game UI or mechanical systems such as scoring, time huds, health points, or levels (there were levels, but they felt much more like scenes in a movie). You step into the shoes of four different characters throughout the course of the game, and it's possible for any and all of those characters to die before you finish; these deaths do not end the game, presumably until the fourth character dies and you no longer have someone to control in the storyline.

Although all four characters are trying to accomplish the same thing - catching a killer and saving a little boy - each has a different "flavor" of conflict. The private investigator gets into "wrong place, wrong time" types of trouble that are loosely tied to his mission but entirely coincidental. The FBI guy stands as the voice of reason pitted against a partner in analysis willing to bend the law (though sometimes FBI guy can bend the law too). The reporter faces survival conflict; similar but different to the PI, her brand of struggle is entirely directed at her and serves as a result of her own actions. And last and most important of all, the father faces desperate moral conflict in which he must make choices that will ostensibly impact whether or not his son lives or dies - imagine Saw crossed with John Q.

Now to the meat of the matter: the transition made in my decision making process. When I played as these characters, I felt very strongly connected to their existence, and I knew that these characters could die. This was powerful knowledge. I also knew that time in the game progressed without me. Combine these two thoughts, and snap decisions become abundant. Add to that equation the fact that you may make choices that allow you to survive but also come with a heavy level of regret or remorse for other characters. Now we have one tough decision making process to master.

Most games are about the survival of your character, this is nothing new. But few point out that your survival can be at the cost of another's. Some make you feel regret that you must harm others to continue, but it doesn't usually stop you. Jason Rohrer's Idealism does this in a very abstract way, but it gives you no alternative: create hostility or fail. Heavy rain paved the road to regret by allowing you to fail at surviving, succeed at surviving at another's cost, or succeed at surviving without pushing others down to the ground. It's more compelling because it's more like real life; by making it more like real life, the game is more likely to also elicit real emotion.

At the start of the game, I found myself making a lot of bad decisions. I hurt someone that appeared to be a danger to my life yet turned out to be totally harmless. Why? Because I knew I had to make a decision, and that this person I was playing didn't have much time to do it. What surprises me, and what I can't truly explain, is that it never occurred to me to pause the game. I don't think I ever would have if a friend hadn't prompted me to when we were making an incredibly important decision. From that moment on, the game felt totally different to me. It also reminded me of something I'd discussed recently about the potential of games to create behavior change.

In a passive medium, the audience needs time to reflect on the decisions that the characters have made. This reflection time often takes place after the choice because you need to know what the character decided to do in order to analyze why they did it and why certain consequences fell into line. In a game, that reflection time takes place before the decision because you're the one making it. Heavy Rain made me feel so much like I was part of a movie that I forgot about some of my game player "super powers," like the option to pause time and consider my options. In some ways, it felt like a cheat. When the game wasn't paused, time passed, and that passage of time sometimes took control of the story away from me; choosing not to make a decision was a choice of its own. By pausing the game, I was eliminating that choice.

I think the game could have easily been done without an ability to pause; it would only be one step closer to real life, to have to make decisions with the situation staring you in the face, never looking away from the TV screen to confer with a friend while the menu hovered over the content, blurring out the details. But by adding that menu, I think this game (unintentionally or otherwise) made a statement that decisions you make from moment to moment are important, so you better think hard about what you do. If this game were meant to teach behavior change, it would provide for the player a unique balance between understanding the pressures you feel when making such behavioral decisions and the amount of thought that needs to go into those decisions. If it were a longer game, I'd bet it could even teach you to make the right moral decision without needing to pause.

One last observation and then I'm done. I love the treatment of morality, a subject that has been played with in games to date in such a light-hearted, explicit, game-y way. Here, you don't get good and evil points for what you did. Here, your character won't grow horns or halos. The closest you'll come to receiving quantitative feedback is through trophies, which you earn for making good or bad decisions alike. All that confronts the player is the situations and the story. But, I would also have to admit that beyond the content, I think it takes a very mature gamer to appreciate a game like that. I hope I'm wrong on that part, but I can't really prove or disprove myself unless I abduct one of my non-gaming friends and sit them down to my PS3 for an hour or ten.

Long story short: play Heavy Rain if you think games can't cause the player to question their behavior, their life values, and their decision-making processes.