Developing Usable Experiences

Wait for it…

November 28th, 2007 11:22 pm —  149 views

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Today was another mad rush through life the universe and everything. Juggling and plate spinning at work whilst trying to avoid the political potholes that seek to bend my rims of idealistic thinking. At least I think it’s idealistic. Could very well be lame, mundane and out of date. So hard to tell when you hear so often “this is the future of ______.” Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t.

After class tonight we met with our instructor to get his input on our group project1. He gave us some interesting perspective and lots to think about but the way it was delivered got me thinking on the way home.

He would give his impression, pose a topic, we would chat about ideas then there would be this long pause. The type of pause that you expect to be followed by a closing comment or some sort of final mention. Maybe a hug and “we’ll see you guys next Christmas….” But it wasn’t. After we suffered through a couple of these long moments of contemplative silence I realized that is exactly what it was. Contemplation. Thinking. The wheels were turning, silently, deliberately, waiting to see what would result. The moments of silence allowed ideas to grow.

This reminded me of a professor from last year. When the lecture was finished and he and the professor he lectured with would ask if students had questions or comments. There would be the normal tense silence filled with silent prayers that class was over. But no questions or raised hands. Shuffling would slowly commence. The wise professor would smile and say, “I realize you need a moment to think about things…we’ll wait for it.” And they would. They would stand there, relaxed, waiting, smiling their wise “we know you’ll think of something” grins while searching the class for that raised hand. And sure enough, it would happen.

So this lesson wasn’t necessarily the lesson that was intended, but it was a lesson none-the-less. Sometimes you need to let things sink in. Allow some pauses. From these pauses come new material, ideas, questions, insights.

Image: I took this last weekend at a group meeting. We were working hard to herd our ideas into something that resembled organized thought.

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  1. This is the MITalkers group project aimed at providing online mental health education modules to University Students. [↩]

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One Response to “Wait for it…”

  1. Dawn on November 29th, 2007 11:58 am

    I miss that wise professor too.

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