shadesofmauve (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shadesofmauve) wrote2012-01-06 12:09 pm
shadesofmauve) wrote2012-01-06 12:09 pm
Entry tags:
My navel, let me show you it!
New years are for unrepentant self-reflection, right?
Epiphany-the-first: This too shall pass
My first real employer's only complaint about my work was that I got defensive when criticized, and I took it to heart. It's importance was drilled in again when I was studying art and graphic design. It's the second most useful thing we learned, I think, after how to give constructive criticism.
I've had ample opportunity to put my practice to the test, and I've realized something: I never learned how not to be defensive. I'm not sure if I can. What I learned was how to make that defensive reaction pass in a shorter and shorter amount of time. It's quick. At most, I have to sleep on something before the negativity transforms into glee (someone paid enough attention to offer me critique! I have direction now! TO THE DRAWING BOARD! etc). Sometimes it only takes a single deep breath.
After more than a decade of conscious work, I haven't managed to expunge this negative trait from my character -- but it has become (usually) such a fleeting thing that it doesn't affect anyone around me.
Today during yoga I realized that a reduction in duration, rather than intensity, applies to some other negative reactions, too. After a few weeks of missed practice, and the usual winter-sedentary knee issues, there were a few poses that left me quivering, feeling the same flood of total infirmity that I used to feel in physical therapy, or when I tried that awful spin cycle class in school. It's like being hit by a freight train carrying a shipment of industrial strength 'I can't.' I know I'll experience the same thing in spring when I get back on my bike. Despite having biked a frickin' century.
This time, though, like in yoga, it will pass. It's still intense, but it's not crippling because it doesn't hang around.
So. Manage to be motivated not by 'not being negative' but by letting the negativity come... and go. Here, let Alan sing to you:
Epiphany-the-second: I am an Expert Beginner:
I have some friends who are so good at what they do, and have been good at it for so long, that they're very bad beginners. It'stoo jarring for them to go from a position of expertise to one of bumbling newbie. I have the opposite problem.
I first realized how freeing it was to be a beginner when I took a fiber arts class. Not having any background in it, it was the least stressful art class I'd ever taken, because I didn't have standards for myselfbeyond 'don't dye myself blue' and/or 'don't get caught in the loom.'.
I'm a good beginner, too -- in my early twenties a few switches flipped, and I went from that awkward nerdy "must hide my ignorance" to a gleeful "I'm a beginner: Teach me!" attitude. People like being set-up as the expert, and you can learn a lot that way. It's easy for me to enjoy, because I really am a fast learner -- at the beginning.
I'm not so hot at follow-through. The lure of trying something new, where I'll have no reason to judge myself, is trong, especially compared to how reliably awful I feel once I move to the intermediate level, or feel I should have moved to the intermediate level.
It's most noticeable with art, esp. drawing. I should be better than I am. I took classes, I have a degree, I've been doing it for years, but I'm still at the 'talented beginner' stage. I believe it's mostly my lack of regular practice, but it's discouraging.
Luckily, this is where Epiphany One comes into play. Two nights ago I spent two hours coloring a picture. I spent most of those two hours flipping back and forth between "I have no business pretending I can make art" and "Ooh, this is fun!" If I'd spent the whole two hours in the glum stage, it would have been awful, but when it comes and goes in flashes, I can handle it -- at least enough to keep going.
For someone who's already a Jane-of-all-trades generalist, an addiction to being a beginner is a problem. The next level of anything requires focus and practice, and the more new skills I half-have, the more scattered I become. There's a distinction between "generalist" and "easily distractible," but you won't find it by lookin' at me.
I'm not giving up on my addiction to being a newbie: I just made arrangements for a month of vocal lessons, for fishes' sakes. It's something I'll be thinking about, though.
Epiphany-the-first: This too shall pass
My first real employer's only complaint about my work was that I got defensive when criticized, and I took it to heart. It's importance was drilled in again when I was studying art and graphic design. It's the second most useful thing we learned, I think, after how to give constructive criticism.
I've had ample opportunity to put my practice to the test, and I've realized something: I never learned how not to be defensive. I'm not sure if I can. What I learned was how to make that defensive reaction pass in a shorter and shorter amount of time. It's quick. At most, I have to sleep on something before the negativity transforms into glee (someone paid enough attention to offer me critique! I have direction now! TO THE DRAWING BOARD! etc). Sometimes it only takes a single deep breath.
After more than a decade of conscious work, I haven't managed to expunge this negative trait from my character -- but it has become (usually) such a fleeting thing that it doesn't affect anyone around me.
Today during yoga I realized that a reduction in duration, rather than intensity, applies to some other negative reactions, too. After a few weeks of missed practice, and the usual winter-sedentary knee issues, there were a few poses that left me quivering, feeling the same flood of total infirmity that I used to feel in physical therapy, or when I tried that awful spin cycle class in school. It's like being hit by a freight train carrying a shipment of industrial strength 'I can't.' I know I'll experience the same thing in spring when I get back on my bike. Despite having biked a frickin' century.
This time, though, like in yoga, it will pass. It's still intense, but it's not crippling because it doesn't hang around.
So. Manage to be motivated not by 'not being negative' but by letting the negativity come... and go. Here, let Alan sing to you:
Epiphany-the-second: I am an Expert Beginner:
I have some friends who are so good at what they do, and have been good at it for so long, that they're very bad beginners. It'stoo jarring for them to go from a position of expertise to one of bumbling newbie. I have the opposite problem.
I first realized how freeing it was to be a beginner when I took a fiber arts class. Not having any background in it, it was the least stressful art class I'd ever taken, because I didn't have standards for myself
I'm a good beginner, too -- in my early twenties a few switches flipped, and I went from that awkward nerdy "must hide my ignorance" to a gleeful "I'm a beginner: Teach me!" attitude. People like being set-up as the expert, and you can learn a lot that way. It's easy for me to enjoy, because I really am a fast learner -- at the beginning.
I'm not so hot at follow-through. The lure of trying something new, where I'll have no reason to judge myself, is trong, especially compared to how reliably awful I feel once I move to the intermediate level, or feel I should have moved to the intermediate level.
It's most noticeable with art, esp. drawing. I should be better than I am. I took classes, I have a degree, I've been doing it for years, but I'm still at the 'talented beginner' stage. I believe it's mostly my lack of regular practice, but it's discouraging.
Luckily, this is where Epiphany One comes into play. Two nights ago I spent two hours coloring a picture. I spent most of those two hours flipping back and forth between "I have no business pretending I can make art" and "Ooh, this is fun!" If I'd spent the whole two hours in the glum stage, it would have been awful, but when it comes and goes in flashes, I can handle it -- at least enough to keep going.
For someone who's already a Jane-of-all-trades generalist, an addiction to being a beginner is a problem. The next level of anything requires focus and practice, and the more new skills I half-have, the more scattered I become. There's a distinction between "generalist" and "easily distractible," but you won't find it by lookin' at me.
I'm not giving up on my addiction to being a newbie: I just made arrangements for a month of vocal lessons, for fishes' sakes. It's something I'll be thinking about, though.
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I realized that if I tried to explain more what it felt like my already far-too-long post would become even longer, so I drew a picture.
EDIT: Now I'm thinking of making it into an icon. It explains so much about me!
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*ahem*
Stasia
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You could make another icon with some generalised picture with the alternating captions "generalist" and "easily distractible" which I would also be very tempted to swipe once you've done it. I don't have the skills (or even the tools, I think) to make animated GIFs.
Oh! And Happy New Year from sunny Maoribank.nz!
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Happy new years to you, too! We even had sun today, though it was the cold kind.
I need to put up a post with private comments to collect mailing addresses for cards. I do like sending snail-mail overseas on occasion!
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What we can do is what you've learned to: We can choose how we react and respond to those thoughts and feelings, whether we latch on to them and own (and be owned by) them or get past them as quickly as possible and move on.
We never become perfect beings of pure energy with no negative thoughts at all. But we can become a lot better at not letting the negativity control or dominate us, and you've done just that.
On the second point: Ooh, yeah, I recognize that Learning Curve*. I just came to terms with the fact that I'm always going to be a Talented Generalist**, and that I will never match the masters of any one thing, but I'll be able to quickly pick up anything I really turn my hand to well enough that someone who isn't skilled in that area will think I'm pretty damn good at it.
*I'd probably use the Icon as well, if you do make one :)
**With thanks to Douglas Coupland for introducing me to a more positive term for it than Jack/Jill/Jane-of-All-Trades.
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Granted, my initial example is very situational, so it doesn't show up more or less often depending on brain chemistry, really, but a lot of other things it's the case.
As for the second, I don't actually find Jane-of-all-trades particularly negative, for me, and I'm definitely a quick enough learner to fake stuff. At some point it'd be nice to move on a little bit in some areas, though!
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So yeah, when I have a bad brain chemistry day (week, month, whatever), I do get more negative thoughts and have more trouble moving past them than when my brain chemistry is good.
But if I've been practicing moving past them, I'll do better on a bad brain chemistry day than if I've slipped back into the habit of letting myself wallow.
"Moving past" is kind of a hazy term here, too. I don't mean just forced cheering up and powering through, but more a process of sort of sitting with the feelings for a bit, acknowledging them, and then letting them go. It's hard to describe, and harder to actually do, but sometimes I can pull it off.
I've heard Jack-of-all-Trades used in a derogatory fashion a number of times, and that association sort of stuck. I think Wargaming forums had something to do with it, there tend to be a lot of people on there who are pretty big on Specialization. Need to think more Heinlein ;)