The Art of Choosing Part 1

課堂筆記 Connection is Why We're Here

We talked about this video of Brene Brown at TEDxHouston.

Concluding statments:
This reminds me me of a book I read a long time ago, I forgot the title, there's a statment that impressed me, that made a big impact. The statement was, if we don't feel … you know, at that time, I was a very unhappy person, and because I was like the person she she talked about in the video, you know, 'we numb our feelings' I tried to chase a kind of life, which had no ups and downs. I just wanted a life, like, that was level. I didn't want happiness, I didn't want pain. Which is a kind of numbness.
But I knew I was really unhappy. And I depended, I found out because of that book, I depended on other people for my happiness. If they think you're worthy, you're happy. If you think you're unworthy, you're unhappy. You give your control away. I remember this statement stayed in my mind for a long time. In the very beginning today, at one point we talked about people who think they are worthy. When we talked about that , this statement came to my mind.

Do you feel differently now? About being level, I mean?

Of course, these fifteen years I've changed a lot. But it's hard to describe, I don't know how to say it.

Connection is Why We're Here.

The key statements in the video, as I heard them, anyways, are below.
For our discussion, I was thinking we could go through these one by one and discuss.

Connection is why we're here.
Connection is the purpose of our lives.
We're wired for it in our brains.

The unnamed thing that unravels connection: Shame.

12/2 What changes can you as a mature person make in the world?

We are not just consumers. We do much more than just buy things.
Our lives are not just personal. The decisions we make for ourselves have an effect far beyond our own lives.
Each of us is an adult, and we we make adult decisions in our lives, and these have effect on the people around us, and in the communities around us.
Each of us has a job, and the decisions we make in that job have an effect in the economy and society around us, even if only in very small ways.


In your capacity as a working adult, you can−−

Apple Economics

At the RO Studio one Friday night, five of us sat down to understand two opinion articles written by Darius Guppy for the Independent and the Telegraph, two British newspapers. The articles argue that our banking system is a fraud, because it creates a virtual economy of such runaway inflation that we are forced to produce beyond the means of the resources on this planet.

As we began to read the article, we realized that we didn't really know what inflation was. Fortunately, Fanny, who works in finance, had an example story for us. "If there were five apples on this table," she said, "and each of us at the table had a coin, each apple would cost one coin."

Slide 1

"Now, if each person at this table had two coins," said Fanny, "each apple would then cost two coins."

The amount of money in a system divided by the amount of product in that system equals the price of what is produced. This is a basic principle of economics. The more money you have in the system, the higher the cost of products.

Slide 2

Now we were ready to attempt the articles before us. The first article began by describing banking as it was first conceived:

11/25 What a 7 year old thinks about how women are drawn in comic books.

Why are female superheros drawn like this, but male superheroes never are?

Okay. For today's discussion, first, read this article (It's short and pretty easy):
A 7-year-old girl responds to DC Comics’ sexed-up reboot of Starfire

10/28 Celebration!!

Maggie got her Ph.D., so this Friday, we're celebrating!!

Come to the A-Plus Dining Sake Bar, which serves sake, beer, cocktails, and lovely things to eat, on AnHe Road, Section 1, Number 33. We're meeting between 7:30 to 8:00.

www.aplusdiningbar.com.tw

map below:

10/14 課堂筆記 Play

Final Statements:
I want to say that it's a lot of fun when all of us were talking about what we played when we were young. I feel like we were playing.
Oh, you're right! The conversation really felt different.
The End! (Point made!)

So coming here on Fridays to discuss, it's not playing?
It's diffrent playing.
I think it's playing, because we're very careful not to dominate each other.
The End!

Well, I was thinking about Wang Jienming, he gets to play for a living.
It can't be playing, because he has to win all the time, it's a job!
It's working!
It's a competition, it's not a game anymore!
The End!
So if you're in an orchestra, it's not really playing either, right?

So, would the world be different if everyone was playing all the time?
Oh, it definitely would.
And I think kids, they don't know what 'learning' is. What they do is just playing. Like my sister's kid, she can read a lot in kindergarten, but she doesn't think she's learning, she's just playing, she doesn't have this idea that she's 'learning'. She just learns out of play.
Just like I watch a Japanese drama, so I learned some Japanese.
Yeah, my friend learned some Cantonese, just by watching Hong Kong dramas. She watched a lot, so she could understand people in Hong Kong when she went there.
My personal feeling is that you have to be playing at some level, in order to learn. You can't learn when you are forced.
End.
Yes!!! Hahaha

Play

First, two short articles to consider:
Playing Isn’t Just For Young Folks (sorry, I lost the link to this article)
One day I decided to take a break from routine and try a new recipe. The next day at work, when asked what I did on my day off, I responded, “I played”, because that’s what it felt like – having some fun trying something different. To my surprise, that co-worker commented that she felt like she had forgotten how to play. And so began a several-minute discussion between all of us on what “play” means.
One woman described being intrigued by watching her grandson, age three, pour water back and forth from several containers and be absorbed in this play for close to thirty minutes. He was enjoying the wetness, watching what a stream of water looks like, seeing one cup fill up and another empty, learning that smaller cups run over when filled from larger cups. (Of course he also was acquiring skills in co-ordination and spacial processing, but he didn’t know that. He was just enjoying himself.)

9/30 課堂筆記 Occupy Wall Street

Participants: Amy, Maggie, Fanny, Stacy, Angela

Final Statements:
After I read their stories, I was so shocked by the real situation in the US right now. And I realized that how large an impact government policies have, every policy, including economic policy and tax policy and so on. So I think for the government, they have a responsibily to allow people to cleary and easily know what they are doing right now, and every policy they take, the have the responsibility to let people know the pros and cons of these policies. Before, I didn't care so much about politics, I thought I didn't want to waste my time seeing these people doing stupid things. But now I think if I don't care about those issues now, maybe I will have no idea how it will be in the future, and why this bad future will have happened. So that's what I found out tonight.

9/30 任重道遠 Occupy Wall Street

Okay, I've changed our topic tonight, because there's something really important going on in the US right now. We had the 'Arab Spring', and now we're having the 'American Fall'. This is really worth talking about, especially on the heels of our economic discussions. They are so inspiring!

Occupywallst.org

Longer video explaining the situation from occupytogether.org:

9/16 課堂筆記 Writing Exercise Changes Perception

Closing Statements from Writing Exercise Changes Perception discussion:

I think we are all struggling with this stereotype in this society. And I realized all of us are being affected by others expectation or others behavior or words. Therefore, i'm thinking we need to say good for others, do good for others, because any words we say, and any behavior we do, will make a huge impact on others, and we'll never know our effect.
And besides, even though it's hard to live without using stereotypes, but we still have to try to be ourselves.

I would say, and let other people be themselves, too. I think that it's harder. I think it's really hard to remember that the person across from you has all their layers of experience and ideas and things.

After today's discussion, I'm reminded that stereotypes are closely related to what we were talking about a few weeks ago, with normal, and not-normal. Behavior matching stereotypes is "normal", so if you break the stereotype, then you're not normal, and that's weird.

Well, I think stereotype is a kind of predjudice, just like I said about the autistic person, what comes in our mind is a man or a boy.

I just realized, helping people is not just letting them be who they are, but actively figuring out ways to help them, like having women or black people write about their values in class, so that it helps them fight stereotype threat.

You know, how do we help children build their values?

Say good things to them?

That's one way.

Or give them more choices.

I think you ahve to actively support that their judgement is correct.

You know, we say good things about kids all the time, we praise them about everything, but we do it wrong, what we do doesn't help. We have to praise them in a useful way.

Yeah, like only when they've done something worth praising, not like "wow, you caught the ball!" when they like catch a ball all the time. And give them real critique when something could be improved.

I think the point is, you take them seriously, like an adult person, not treat them like some weird small being that has to be managed, like a pet or something.