Connected and invisible

These last days I thought about a particular state of mind that I may have partially described before (https://aghisladraws.wordpress.com/2017/11/20/on-disappearing-while-observing/ as a past version of this post), that is the state I feel most comfortable in – comfortable as in fully present-effective, not as cozily quiet.

This particular state of mind manifests itself when I’m able to pay attention to what I see best with my mind’s eyes. It’s the small changes in nature or in some person in flow busy with their task, and with a special joy, watching over someone taking a break. I blend in the surroundings (in the social meaning of it, as I don’t talk or move much, so not interacting means disappearing) and I become a sentinel, attentive and protective.

I first clearly felt and described it in a memorable sunrise back in my university years where we hid in the mountains to observe and count chamois (we ended up seeing none, but did see deer and wild boars). Our scientific success was dependent on our ability to be invisible to the animals around us. I enjoyed that so deeply! I was a pair of eyes and a logbook: I was nothing else. I have rarely felt self-fulfillment that intensely, the feeling of doing what I do best, and doing it very well.

I tried to explain that to my employers over the years, but mostly they thought I intended to be passive (which is the opposite of that state) or at least not ambitious (in the sense of ready to break old schemes). They managed to miss that it’s the necessary first step for me to become one with my task space and introduce manageable improvements. Starting to change things before even grasping their nature is at best a risky path (not because it never works; but when it works, it’s by chancey match and not by plan).

On a more personal level, I am often in this mindset with the people I can spend a lot of time with. I become good at spotting where their attention is, without them telling me, and make their work/actions easier. Some found it creepy, because they felt constantly monitored; others basked in the attention and enjoyed the assists. To rule out the creepy interpretation I have started to be clear upfront that I do it with a helpful intention and that I stop if that feels uncomfortable. This is when I act. When I don’t act, and neither does the other person, it’s the quietest mix of relaxation and reciprocal motionless attention.

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Bilingual in areas

Recently I read an article about bilingual people’s brain activity according to language spoken/read. I honestly don’t remember much of the methods nor conclusions, but I thought about my use of languages, and it’s quite evident that I’m not even fully bilingual when I consider the two languages I learned as a child. Especially back then, each language belonged to non overlapping environments (home, school, books, movies…), and even growing up, each environment kept its language or at least its strongly preferred language.

That’s why I don’t see myself as bilingual in the sense of being able to use any of the two languages interchangeably. Not to mention the two more languages I learned later in life, that are even more markedly domain-specific.

Weather and clouds

I finished reading a small book about weather prediction by observation of clouds: “Wolkenbilder Wettervorhersage” . It was an easy-to-read guide through the complex field of weather prediction and the more intuitive interpretation of clouds as indicators for humidity, wind, temperature and pressure. The scientific approach was enriched by clear pictures, that had for me a significant artistic interest naturally embedded in them. How can one not think of the many paintings and drawings, where the artists tried to convey the lightness and vibrancy of clouds and skies, as well as the difficulty of capturing the textures and contrasts with a camera?

I liked the first chapters, that described the main weather states and sequences for Germany. I guess that the latitude and the simple orography of the country makes the weather dependent on medium to large-scale weather phenomena, and the weather prediction seems pretty straightforward. Now I feel more knowledgeable about what I see in the sky, and I’m reassured by my new ability of deciphering the messages hidden in the clouds literally in plain sight.

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Drawing goats: the horns

This morning I went outside before it could get too hot. I went straight to the goats’ enclosure and found many children greeting and petting them. I walked to the other side of the enclosure, on the bridge above it, and started sketching.

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At first the goats were really far away and I could only draw the outlines. These are two small goats in the first page. Then I focused on an older goat laying down in the shade, and what I could see best were its horns. I went on sketching horns in all possible orientations. Their shape is not easy to understand, especially as I don’t have depth perception: so the sketches become flat just like pictures. They are the clearest way to show two important facts: first, that the horns are not cylindrical, and second, that they follow a wide spiral. When the spiral of one horn is seen from the side (with the axis coming out of the page, so to speak), it makes a very round arc, but then the other horn has the funniest shape, as the axis of the spiral is almost parallel to the page and the horn section (which is sort of tear-shaped) makes all sort of sharp angles and almost rectangular shapes. The 90-degree angle midway is the oddest form that comes out of this combination of shapes, and I find it the most recognisable goat horn marker. I will definitely come back and try to observe the horns better. In the meanwhile, enjoy these three relaxed goats 🙂

Nature journaling – first page

A very short post about today’s observations in nature:

I tried to focus on something simple at the park (where a lot was going on, and I don’t start about what is going on around the world…) – something down to earth. The ground just in front of me became my observation area and I picked a pinecone as main subject. Not pictured are ants, tiny spiders, aphids, various grasses, and a green caterpillar that fell from the birch tree above me. It was likely an orange underwing. I took it back on the birch and looked at it climbing the trunk in its characteristic looping gait. Just as I arrived there, a small treecreeper was hopping up the birch tree and chirping very quietly.

On different ways to scan the environment

In these past days I have been noticing two extremes of a range, in the way people scan the outside world. These will be my thoughts and observations, even if I can easily guess that this has been analysed before by other people and quite likely by domain experts. If you have sources related to this topic, please leave a comment!

I first thought that the extremes of this range could be similar to the prey and predator schemas of scanning the world, but I realised I know way too little about it, so I will not use those labels. I will use instead the terms “constant scanner” and “optional scanner”.

The constant scanners tend to check the environment (which can be the landscape, the email inbox, the task list, the servers in the network, the news…) quite often, with both the fear of having missed out an incoming problem, and of not being sure to look for the right signals for the problem. The constant scanners tend to be suspicious and look at things under multiple angles, and are reluctant to classify a signal without cross-checking multiple signals/information sources. They tend to be alarmed by small deviations from the usual data flow, as they are afraid it is a sign of a problem that can grow large if not addressed in time. They tend to assume they missed a sign, and try to get better at observing.

On the other end of the range, the optional scanners tend to classify signals and issues once and for ever, check the environment when they decide it is time for it, and address problems when they grow beyond a certain size. They tend to expect the environment to send signals in their own language, i.e. that they don’t have to interpret or fill up with further information. They are often complaining that the signals from the environment are not clear enough for them to act, and tend to hold the environment responsible.

There is of course the whole set of nuances between those two, and the same person can fluctuate along the range, depending on time or on the activity.

I find myself very often near the constant scanner extreme, and I realise I spend a lot of time trying to notice incoming issues even outside my own area of responsibility, mostly because I wish to spare other people the burden of a problem grown too big, and therefore I lend them with pride and even joy my sharpened attention to details. But sometimes I feel like the dog that barks to warn about the incoming storm, and is asked to stop: I know I am not 100% sure it will be a life-threatening storm, but I would never forgive myself for not barking for a really serious event. I wish this could be seen as a positive skill, that allows others to focus on their activities, knowing that I’m keeping a vigilant eye on the surroundings, and would warn them in time.

That’s it for now. I look forward for your comments and for links for further reading!

The way and the shortcuts

I was thinking about how setting a goal shapes the way one takes to reach it.

Let me pick an example with music, my most familiar environment. Let’s say my orchestra plans to play a given difficult piece for next concert. That goal will influence all rehearsals, filling them with a detailed plan, that includes the progressive steps to the full execution of that piece: separate rehearsals per section, focus on getting to play to the required speed, focus on expression, and finally playing the piece properly from start to finish.

When difficulties arise during rehearsals and it starts to look like we are not progressing as fast as we thought, it’s time to find shortcuts. We simplify our parts, play a little slower than required, remove details. This is where I start to diverge from how one is expected to work. I rarely think about the goal directly, it is for me more of a part of the landscape that I sometimes remember to look at, but my interest is on my immediate surroundings, on the atmosphere at the current rehearsal, on what I can do right now. I’m relieved that someone else is responsible for keeping the boat sailing straight towards the goal, because I just couldn’t! My work is more of a fractal exploration, without direction, with the focus on how I walk, and no eye on the time – in this mindset, shortcuts simply make no sense. I observe and I accidentally also take part to the rehearsal. This is where I’m not offering any grip to the usual motivation talks which sound like  “Don’t you feel the pressure, the urge to reach the goal?”. No, I don’t. It doesn’t mean I explicitely avoid it, but simply that it will be the side effect of me having the space to wander at will. I first had to prove that my random exploration takes me to the goal anyway, before I was given the trust to be left free alongside the bridled horses, apparently aimless, for the surprise of some.

I felt that this can be a good parallel with how one works with animals, for example during horse riding. I sometimes get the feeling that the rider has a goal in mind and gets to the point where the test approaches and they start looking for shortcuts, but that is where+why the horse loses connection – because the horse doesn’t seem to think in terms of goals, and the proposed shortcuts look like forced steps that take attention further away from the flow of observation, of being in the present. This gearing up tends to make things work both worse and slower, it requires even more shortcuts, and that brings the opposite of the desired effect!  It takes a lot of trust to stop this vicious cycle when the deadline is approaching, but re-focusing on the present seems to me one of the few respectful and efficient ways out.

I hope that makes sense! Let me know if that resonates with you, I’m curious to read about your experiences with deadlines, goals and shortcuts.

The audience and the stage

Source: my Flickr

I was at a concert in Philharmonie last night, sitting in the audience. After many concerts where I have been on the stage, it was a strange sensation. Once again I felt out of place sitting among the listeners, even if I could never have been playing with such a brilliant team of musicians; but on a personal level I felt near to them. I saw them exchanging glances before an especially hard passage, syncing tempo and movements, laughing sincerely when they enjoyed the music they were creating, finishing a piece and immediately rearranging the instruments for the next one. I think it’s because I’ve been on the stage and in the backstage for so long that I can pierce through the wall of what the musicians offer the public as a final product, and get a glance on how they build it.

This made me think about a further point. I keep saying that I prefer to see rehearsals than concerts or shows. What I mean is that, having been playing music myself, I give high value on the way a piece is slowly assembled rather than on the single execution at the concert. It’s obviously a necessary goal, but it has almost no value for me if it’s the only part of the way I can access, because one can see a tiny fraction of the heap of small steps that were required to get there.

That’s why I’m playing again with JEB and joined a choir, to get even more backstage and rehearsals 🙂 More posts about that soon!

The copilot syndrome

I recently thought about my habit of being ready to take over responsibility from others. The classical situation is when I’m with one or more people in a car and I am in the passenger seat. I call it the “copilot syndrome”.

In this situation I feel I have to be alert and ready to help: I check the road signs, the directions, the weather ahead, I ask the driver if they’re tired or thirsty. The funny thing is that I would not be able to take the wheel: I stopped driving in 2010 and am too scared to try again, especially without preparation. So I am in the funny position to feel a lot of responsibility but be unable to actually do much. At the same time I can’t relax and for example simply look outside of the window, or sleep. I have the fear that I would not notice something important and that it would be my fault, that I should have paid attention; as if there were a responsibility chain and I am always the next in line, and all others (except the first in line) come after me, and even worse: none of them would step up if I don’t act.

Source: lupineandruby‘s pinterest

The other, maybe more important, funny thing I finally noticed is that it’s rarely necessary that I pay so much attention, or that I feel this copilot burden at all. It doesn’t mean not caring about how the car trip is going, or be passive if doubts or problems arise – it’s more about feeling a more reasonable amount of responsibility and not waste energy and attention being fully alert while the situation is well under control.

I can understand how my readiness to step up has often been seen as great resource and a cool fallback for the group of people I was part of, because others were reassured that I would take care of glitches before/instead of anyone else. But it’s a disaster for me, when this means that I have to constantly feel in charge: this indeed happened on a couple jobs, that I luckily managed to leave before they drained all my energies.

I have a few hunches on how I learned to feel this obligation to pick up responsibilities. The important thing now is that I have a plan to get rid of this habit. My current strategy is to pick situations where actually nothing serious can happen if I don’t pick up the lead, and see what indeed happens. The experiment is ongoing and it’s early to tell if this approach would work in more critical situations; but I can already say that I feel more relaxed, and even reassured that I’m making progress.

Dog-sitting: on responsibility and needs

My dog-sitting is getting more and more interesting, as I am getting better in understanding what is happening in the communication and interaction with the little dog I’m taking care of.

(Warning! Long post ahead. Have a funny dog picture!)

One thing I read in Karin Actun’s book is that we can map dogs’ roles as “higher status” and “lower status”. She doesn’t identify a pyramid hierarchy because she observed that dogs interact only in pairs (themselves and another dog), so there is no “boss” of the whole pack, but rather a dog who shows its higher status to any other dog in one-on-one encounters. Her explanation is more complete but I hope this summary is good enough.

The important thing that she underlines is that “high status” doesn’t mean “I can use my force against you, I can make you comply to what I want”. It’s more about “I can use space and resources as I need, and if you are in the way you will make room for me”.  But not only that: the crucial part for me comes now. So far I thought of authority just like this: someone who can decide something I can’t contradict. But her observations on dogs brought another important point: who has a high status has also the responsibility to make sure the ones with lower status have their needs met. A good example is parenting: parents and other individuals who take care of younger ones should make sure that these have food, water, rest, protection, play, challenges and so on. If they don’t, their authority is hollow and dangerous for the younger ones, and it’s better that they start to take care of themselves on their own – most likely against the will of the authority.

In my case, as dog-sitter I am responsible for the dog if I make sure he gets food, fresh water, movement, interesting activities, interaction with other dogs, cleaning and brushing, and that I notice when something is wrong and he could be ill. I could not claim respect or obedience if I forget about one or more of these things. That would be the reason for the dog to think: “She is not noticing that I have this need! I must take care of that myself. I will not listen to what she tells me about it, because my needs could not be met and it would be the worst thing ever.” and… he would be right!

I notice quite clearly when he needs movement and fun, as he prompts me to throw his favourite ball by pushing it towards me with his nose and barking at me. I almost see him saying: “I really need to move! I really need to play with you because I was so bored this morning all alone at home!” and I can’t tell him to be quiet in that precise moment, because I see that the need is strong and that he wants to make sure I get it. I’m almost sad that he is telling it so strongly, as if I could not understand. I could work on making myself respected by starting with making clear that it’s my decision when he can run and jump, but it implies that I know when he has played enough, and I have no experience of that. What I’m doing is to give him many chances to satisfy his needs, so that he knows I am actually taking care of them, and in some occasions I decide otherwise – and he will likely be fine with that. I am new to dog-sitting so I need to learn to take responsibility in steps.

I started practising this when we go out for a walk and he needs/wants to sniff and mark at almost every tree. What he used to do is to run as far ahead as the leash allowed, then stop square at some interesting scent and refuse to move on until he was done. I was first pulled by him, then I was pulling him and forcing him to go on – and it was becoming unpleasant for both. What I do now is to be the first to walk towards a nice tree or bush, and stop there for a bit. I make sure to stop in a lot of places, because I am not so good in picking the ones with nice scents! I now see him following me, come to the tree, sniff around intently, marking, and then look at me as to say “Where do you want to go next?”. Sometimes I pick an uninteresting tree and he just looks at me like “We can go on, pick another one” – but he doesn’t rush ahead anymore, he is more relaxed now that he doesn’t have to take care of the sniffing all on his own and even against me.

While focusing on the interest in scents I got the bonus effect that he follows me more often than he walks ahead of me, and he doesn’t pull that much on the leash either. He is even OK when I tell him to go on when he finds a nice scent on his own, he just trots towards me when I call him because he likely trusts that I will give him another occasion soon. I could have got there by using force or punishment, but I would have ignored the need of inspecting scents that is important to him, and I would have given the message that I don’t care about them. I would have become a strong but awful boss!

At this point I am talking of needs as a whole and I don’t know if some are true needs or just habits, whims or anything else. My point now is to show him that I can take care of his basic needs, that I want to listen to him and his requests, and manage them for him. I am learning too! I can’t expect the dramatic changes that an experienced dog owner would obtain in this situation. It’s not even my goal. What I need is to sample as much information as possible and make sure I learn a little bit at every step, while not hurting the dog in the process.