So as far as an idea for my final project,

i am kind of considering writing a short story, mainly with pictures (kind of like a comic book)

i really like the idea of summing up the pages with one or two sentences that describe that experience and then drawing a picture to help recall that moment so that i could look back on it and fully engage in that time again. 

i want it to have sort of have a child like vibe to it and be more interactive. Right now it is pretty flat and thought i feel like i have some cool thoughts on there i want my thoughts to come to life with some kind of interactive possibility. i had in mind a children's book with pop up pictures and moveable elements that help the journal to breathe. 

I'm still not 100% sure how this will go but I'm playing with that idea right now. if you have any suggestions or more ideas please let me know!

Writing Down The Bones

         

                 I loved reading through “Writing down the bones” and taking little pieces of her writing out of her book and with me in real life. Like when she said, “Your little will cant do anything. It takes Great Determination. Great Determination doesn’t mean you just making an effort. It means the whole universe is behind you and with you- the birds the trees, sky, moon and ten directions.” it is about embracing the whole world as it is and becoming connected with the universe and it is then that the words will pour out of you into a beautiful string of inspiration. I also liked when she commented about what it means to have a name,“A name is what we carry all of our lives and we respond to its call”. We are called these names all of our lives and that has an effect on our lives. We must embrace our identity in this world and learn to be perfectly ourselves. She also had a lot of great things to say about writing, like she always does.“This is what it means to be a writer; to be the carrier of details that make up history, to care about the orange booths in the coffee shop in owatonna.” I completely agree to this and love how she gets it. She said, “our job is to say a holy yes to the real things of our life as they exist” saying the “real truth” about who we are, paying attention to the details of our surroundings and embracing them as they are and for what they are, which goes beyond the first glance. Being a writer means you take a second look and really experience what you see as if you yourself created it. I absolutely love that Natalie Goldberg can see this and describe it so eloquently. She gets it and you can feel how inspired she is about life because she has learned to fully embrace her surroundings whole heartedly. You can always tell when someone has been inspired because it becomes so easy for them to inspire others. Great read!

Week 6

       I absolutely loved the reading for this week, Paulson is a phenomenal writer. His writing felt both honest and inspiring. I especially loved the first chapter “a recovering jerk”. I fully agree with the author when he says that people have given up on the crucial  “harsh” feedback that is necessary for the improvement in another person. I get it its scary some times to say “Hey! This is not your best work and you could do better” but it is  necessary in order to motivate that person to succeed and be the best that he/she can be. I think that all criticism can be well received if love is at the root of it. When a person truly believes you care about them, they are better able to accept harsher feedback. I really liked when the author said he was a “recovering jerk” for that statement was pretty comical for me. 

I loved his other chapters as well, for I also know so many people who spend most of their time complaining and never actually doing anything about fixing the problem. Often people think they will “feel better” if they just complain about an issue, which in some cases that could be true, I totally understand the need for being validated and venting a problem out of intensity, but at the same time, at the end of that venting, there needs to be some sort of action put forth for change. If this does not happen the venting turns unproductive and ineffective. This was a great read!

   

The first article, Putting Ethnographic Writing, showed some good perspective on how to observe another culture through your own bias and previous experiences of that cultures as well as improving your writing throughout the process. Before I had read this article I had no idea what the term ethnographic writing meant. Now I know that Ethnographic writing is how you write about real people in their cultures and customs. Ethnographic can, as the article mentioned, “make you think about ethics (how you’re presenting information, how that information might affect people if made public, being as accurate as you can) and knowledge (what it is you really know at the end of the project and how you present that knowledge without sounding more confident than you should)”. I think this type of analysis can really help you to create creatively as well and bring a genuine depiction of a character as well as give you an understanding of a character other than what you know. As the article had stated, “ it can improve your understanding of people and their ways of thinking/talking; it can improve the lives of the people you write about; it can help you reflect on your own positions within cultures”. This is good advice for researching cultures. Something else I found was interesting was when the article said, “we adopt a stance that’s both distanced (observing) and interactive (participatory), and good ethno- graphic writing emerges from the juxtaposition of those stances”. I am learning about this in my other class, how one can create a bias on a particular subject based on their past experiences and I thought this was good to consider as you play the “observer” role as a writer. 

Im not really sure what the purpose of reading this article was other than to get us to think deeper about a particular character as you consider their culture and what makes them them. I liked getting my brain in that mode, developing the back story of a person and figuring out why they do what they do.  Not sure if this was the purpose but it’s what I learned. 

The second Article, Participant Observation as a Data Collection Method, I mainly just skimmed over it. I recognized that it had a lot of helpful information about observing your particular subject and how to collect data to benefit you in your writing. It discussed how it was important to play the “observer” role and said, “Observations enable the researcher to describe existing situations using the five senses, providing a "written photograph" of the situation under study”.  It then discussed “fieldwork” and how, “Fieldwork involves "active looking, improving memory, informal interviewing, writing detailed field notes, and perhaps most importantly, patience" and went on with different techniques. It discussed the pros and cons of observation work and getting access to different information. These two articles paired well together but they were a little boring and not very inspiring. 

"It Splits You Open and Softens Your Heart"

         I really enjoyed reading these article and learning more about the concept of physical distance.  I never really thought about the physical distance I place between myself and another object depending on my ability to relate to that particular object or not. This makes me consider ones bias, in a way I guess it works one in the same. One bias can determine how one arrives to a particular conclusion or decision. In the same sense, the physical distance because of your bias and can cause you to be less connect or influenced by that object, which is exactly what they meant when expressing in the article that, "the concept exists in the mind's eye of the individual and it is their subjective perception that uniquely determines "psychic distance".[2] By its very nature psychic distance is a humanistic reflection of individual acuity and not a collective, organizational or societal perspective". This is true in nearly all situations but is not often considered in the moments of decision making. 

I guess I can now consider this even as i pick out what i particularly enjoyed about in Writing Down the Bones which probably come from my own ability to connect to what the author is trying to express. 

My physical distance allowed me to enjoy how she continually expressed that the words you write down do not define you, they are an expression of you in that moment as she says, "Stay fluid behind those black and white words, they are not you. They are a great moment going through you. a moment you were awake enough to capture". This author is extremely poetic, I love her ability to grasp the magical world of writing as she says, "We can step through moons right into bears. You will take leaps naturally if you follow your thought because the mind spontaneously takes great leaps. you must let its expression be born in you and on paper. don't hold too tight, allow it to come out how it needs to rather than trying to control it.”

Writing can be powerful and fun and so very exciting. It can take you through worlds and gift you with images you didn’t even know existed. I love that she allows thoughts to move in and out and emphasizes on not trying too hard to keep the thoughts you loved in a moment so much as running with the new ones that are constantly presenting themselves to you every day. Anyways, the reading was very insightful and inspiring as I gained new perspective and better ways of expressing that perspective through these helpful readings. 

Auto Biography Analysis

Hellen Keller

I analyzed Helen Keller’s autobiography because I was interested in how she processed her sudden shift into darkness. How to see and hear one moment and then to have it disappear the next. Though she was young when I feel like it would cause a closeness in yourself to happen when you seem to be the only person you can speak to. In her autobiography she wrote great descriptions of the memories of her home growing up and seemed to have a positive outlook on life. I only read the one chapter and I suppose I was hoping for more of the “diary” experience instead of the carefully pronounced thoughts that were placed for an over all purpose. I wanted the honesty of the moment analysis (which I found to be extremely hard to find about anyone) but I suppose that the “in the moment” thoughts with Helen Keller would have been in possible. She did, however, describe so beautifully the moments before her illness of being the garden as she wrote, “What joy it was to lose myself in that garden of flowers, to wander happily from spot to spot, until, coming suddenly upon a beautiful vine, I recognized it by its leaves and blossoms, and knew it was the vine which covered the tumble-down summer-house at the farther end of the garden!” I really felt like I was able to imagine with so much detail the actually garden in which she herself was discovering. I also loved when she wrote,“The beginning of my life was simple and much like every other little life. I came, I saw, I conquered, as the first baby in the family always does.” I felt like this was very poetic and relatable. Her experiences were profound and and I find her to be extremely courageous for coming out on top and discovering how to discover the world again as she writes,“Then, in the dreary month of February, came the illness which closed my eyes and ears and plunged me into the unconsciousness of a new-born baby.”I couldn’t imagine this happening to be and I found her speaking on her experience to be so beautiful and poetic as she describes the moments leading up to her losing her site as her going “away from the once-loved light, which came to me dim and yet more dim each day.”And then to be left in that place in which you no longer can remember what it was like before this as she writes,“Gradually I got used to the silence and darkness that surrounded me and forgot that it had ever been different”. 

This experience to me is truly significant and was a very interesting read. I couldn’t imagine going through anything like this and find her to be extremely brave and exactly the line she wrote above, “she came she saw she conquered”

Tina Fey

I then decided to analyze Tina Feys autobiography to lighten the mood up a little bit. Tina Fey, a comedian/actress/writer. I absolutely loved the short chapter I was able to read online. She is HILARIOUS. You can just feel her personality come through this entire book which I found to be so interesting how writing, a flat combination of letters placed on paper, could in fact allow your personality to shine so beautifully.She made light of her scar that she has on her face and the fuss her friends and family made over it, giving her an “inflated sense of self”, later realizing that the attention was not because she was “beautiful” but because they felt “sorry” for her. I loved how funny Tina Fey made every honest situation and left me feeling inspired to “be myself” as she made the honestly look so beautiful and refreshing. Tina Fey went over awkward moments of her growing up and reading the whole first chapter made me want to but the entire book. I felt automatically like I could read it forever, which was very different from reading the Helen Keller autobiography (for obvious reasons) because it engaged me straight from the beginning. Helen Keller I think I approached it as this profound experience that I was going to gain some distant but useful insight on a matter I would never understand. Tina Fey was light and could easily, being a journey through her woman hood, relatable as I am a woman. Even though this was a published autobiography I felt like there was so much honesty in her writing that it made me love reading it!

Ozzy Osbourne

The next one I read was Ozzy Osbourne. This was was the best. I felt like again this showed so much honestly as though he was speaking through the story. He was really funny too as she talked about the first time he robbed a place. He said that he thought he was really coming up on some loot when in reality he grabbed some baby clothes. I just thought he was a funny only man who was going back on his young adolescent life when he thought he was so cool. I loved that he cussed through this book as though you were sitting next to him and he was telling you the story while having a beer or something. I also love the terms he uses like “quid” for money and so on. He talked about the first time he almost went to prison for stealing and how silly he was for wearing a “thumbless glove” that left perfect fingerprints all over the place for the cops to find. Then he talked about the town he grew up in and how there wasn’t much going on there. I liked that he started this book with how his dad said that he was “going to be somebody some day” and journeyed through his nothing times until his something times. 

Each of these analysis brought something new to the table, from serious to seriously funny, I found that each autobiography brought to life these characters that otherwise seemed so distant from the real world. I feel like I was able to actually see them in the rawness of their experiences. It helped to make them real for me. Each writer had different “moves” throughout their writing, whether it was to inspire and touch your heart or if it was to make light of situations through comedy. I found it enjoyable to ready each of these unique writings. Good laughs! 

The Happiness Project

        As I read the Happiness Project chapter 8 I began to understand more of Zacks reasons for not being in love with the book. It did, to me, seem a bit forced and lacked imagination as she said,"i wanted to put the happiness of others before my own happiness" feeling scripted and clique  like she read that somewhere and felt like it was what she was suppose to say. I felt like there could have been more authenticity to her in how she arrived at her conclusions. I guess most of the chapter left me asking myself, “have I  already read this somewhere?” and didn’t provide fresh air to any one perspective.  

There were, however, parts of the chapter that I did liked. I really appreciate the quote, "there are times in the lives of most of us, when we would have given all the world to be as we were but yesterday, when yesterday had passed over us unappreciated and not enjoyed.”I feel that so often we waste our time with pointless worriment that can neither change a single problem nor help us to arrive at a solution, but rather can keep us trapped inside that one particular situation for hours upon end. We are then just wasting time and forgetting to appreciate and cease the moments of here and now. I think that people can often stay in this state of mind their entire lives and not even realize it.  

Writing can, as she puts it, help"[capture] the floods of moments that passed practically unnoticed"and bring them alive again. For this reason, I also appreciated her idea of keeping a one sentence journal (though i know, I, on the other hand, would get lost in endless pages of thoughts). I like this idea of trying to tie everything, good or bad, into one perfect string of carefully chosen words, to express and capture the feeling of that moment. To me that sounds beautiful. That’s one reason why i love writing. You have the ability of slowing down time with the process of seeing, hearing, smelling, and tasting your surroundings as you place them on paper  to be seen and heard forever. It truly is a gift to savor the moments that made you once feel alive. 

I also had a love/hate relationship on the section of gratitude. Though I agreed of the importance of thankfulness and appreciating yourself and your surroundings, I didn’t like the way she arrived at this topic for I felt like it mirrored too similarly the same thought of the one sentence journal. It then came off redundant and forced. It felt, again, inauthentic.  

Personally, I would not be concerned with a moments happiness, for It comes and goes with every passing situation. Instead I would focus on learning to be “joyful” for joy can be found in all situations. Joy sees past the present “misfortune” and knows their is a light on the other side.  

Anyways, over all I appreciated her perspective for any internal thought can be food for the curious mind. 

Click the Happiness Project to read the chapter for yourself!