If Kids Made the Rules…

“My mom should look at me when I talk to her.  She always only looks at her iPhone!  It makes me mad!”  This was the response of a ten year old, when asked:  “What rules would you make for your parents regarding the use of technology?” 

We’re quick to make rules for kids when it comes to the use of technology.   Is this working?  Is there another way?

What if the kids are just imitating us?  What if we put the phone down?  What if we could set a great example for kids regarding the appropriate use of technology?

And – what if doing this turned out to be as beneficial for us, and our relationships, as it would be for them?

Mark Matousek, in a Psychology Today article, wrote, “You learn the world from your mother’s face.  The mother’s eyes, especially, are a child’s refuge, the mirror where children confirm their existence.  From the doting reflection of its mother’s eyes, a baby draws its earliest, wordless lessons about connection, care, and love, and about how being ignored – which every child is sooner or later – makes the good feeling disappear.”

Where are those good feelings for this frustrated eight year old girl?    “I used to snuggle with my mom in the morning.  Now, she’s always playing Scrabble when I curl up next to her. She should stop playing Scrabble and cuddle with me!”

At brunch, my friends, both doctors on call, frequently check their iPhones.  It’s not surprising that their one year old constantly reaches for the iPhone, often jamming it in his mouth.  The iPhone is the target of his parent’s attention.  Why shouldn’t it be the target of his attention?

Psychologist Dan Siegel, tells us that a mother’s gaze plays a crucial role in the development of empathy. “We learn to care, quite literally, by observing the caring behavior of our parents toward us.”  When mom’s gaze is fixed on the screen, might this have an impact on the child’s ability to be empathic?

A twelve year old noticed that, even in front of the television, his father was missing in action:  “My dad used to watch TV with me.  Now he’s like, sitting next to me, on his iPad or iPhone, and it’s like I’m alone.  My dad should watch TV with me for real.  Like he used to.”

We’re also teaching the next generation how to be safe on the road.  Or not.  “Texting while driving isn’t even legal.  My mom and dad do it all the time.  They won’t stop even when I tell them to stop.  And it’s not legal, right? Grown-ups shouldn’t text and drive.”

Imitation and modeling are among the most powerful tools we have for creating behavior change, particularly for children.  When we start making rules for our kids around the use of technology, let’s enlist them in the process.  They’re loaded with wisdom.

 

 

Conscious Computing

Conscious Computing Allows Technology to Become a Prosthetic for Engaging with Our Full Potential

Personal technologies today are prosthetics for our minds.

In our current relationship with technology, we bring our bodies, but our minds rule.

“Don’t stop now, you’re on a roll. Yes, pick up that phone call, you can still answer these six emails. Watch the Twitter stream while working on PowerPoint?  Why not?” Our minds push, demand, coax, and cajole. “No break yet, we’re not done. No dinner until this draft is done.”

Our tyrannical minds conspire with enabling technologies and our bodies do their best to hang on for the wild ride.

Glenn Fleishman posted on software that disables bits of the computer to make us more productive and to minimize distractions. Programs like Freedom, Isolator, RescueTime, LeechBlock, Turn Off the Lights and others were mentioned — all tools that block distractions. This software category is called:  Internet Blocking Productivity Software.  Users can choose to disable Internet access and/or local network access. Users claim that software like Freedom makes them more productive by blocking tempting distractions.

I’m not opposed to using technologies to support us in reclaiming our attention. But I prefer passive, ambient, non-invasive technologies that address our bodymind, over parental ones.

Consider the Toyota Prius. The Prius doesn’t stop in the middle of a highway and say, “Listen to me, Mr. Irresponsible Driver, you’re using too much gas and this car isn’t going to move another inch until you commit to fix that.” Instead, a display engages us in a playful way and our body implicitly learns to shift to use less gas.

Glenn was kind enough to call me for a comment as he prepared his post. We talked about email apnea, continuous partial attention, and how, while software that locks out distractions is a great first step, our ultimate opportunity is to evolve our relationship with personal technologies.

With technologies like Freedom, we take away, from our mind, the role of tyrant, and re-assign that role to the technology. The technology then dictates to the mind. The mind then dictates to the body. Meanwhile, the body that senses and feels, that turns out to offer more wisdom than the finest mind could even imagine, is ignored.

There are techniques and technologies that actually tune us in to our bodies, and our nervous systems.  These technologies let us know when we’re stressed, or when we’re engaged.  One of these technologies, from Heartmath, has been particularly helpful to me.  A clip goes on the earlobe, and is connected to a small, lightweight box, that can sit next to the computer.  There are lights on the box that indicate the state of the nervous system.  One of these products, the emWave2, can be used while doing work on the computer (in other contexts as well).  Heartmath also offer software games that work with the emWave2.  The 5-10 minute games involve actions that are totally controlled by the state of your nervous system.

At the heart of compromised attention is compromised breathing. Breathing, attention, and emotion, are commutative. Athletes, dancers, and musicians are among those who don’t have email apnea. Optimal breathing contributes to regulating our autonomic nervous system and it’s in this regulated state that our cognition and memory, social and emotional intelligence, and even innovative thinking can be fueled.

Scientists, like Antonio Damasio, Daniel Siegel, and Daniel Goleman, have shown us that aspects of our intelligence come from sensing and feeling and that our bodies offer a kind of wisdom.

Thirty years ago, personal computing technologies created a revolution in personal productivity, supporting a value on self-expression, output and efficiency. The personal communications technology era that followed the era of personal productivity amplified accessibility and responsiveness. Personal technologies have served us well as prosthetics for the mind, in service of thinking and doing.

Our focus has been on technologies as prosthetics for the mind, and human-as-machine style productivity.  This has led to burn-out, poor health, poor sleep, and what I call email apnea or screen apnea.  We wonder where our attention has gone.  Turns out, it’s right where we left it — with our ability to breathe fully.

We can use personal technologies that are prosthetics for our beings, to enhance our lives.  I call this Conscious Computing.

We can use technology to help enable Conscious Computing, or we can find it on our own, through attending to how we feel.  For advice from a musician on how to do Conscious Computing, I interviewed the organist, Cameron Carpenter.

Conscious Computing with the help of passive, ambient, non-invasive Heart Rate Variability (HRV)  technology is poised to take off over the next few years.  It has the potential to help all of us learn the skills that musicians, athletes and dancers have, that immunizes them from email apnea.

With a musical instrument, it’s awkward at first.  All thumbs.  Uncomfortable.  We don’t know how to sit, stand or breathe.  With practice, a musician becomes self-contained versus merged with the instrument.  So it will be with personal technology.  Now, a prosthetic of mind, it will become a prosthetic of being.  A violinist with a violin.  Us with our gadgets,.  Embodied.  Attending.  Self-contained.  Present.

Quantified Self: Can We Measure What Really Matters?

Chris Anderson’s April 7, Google+ post describes the quantified self lifestyle:

Philips DirectLife, Nike Fuelband, Polar FA20 Activity monitor watch, a Withings scale, a Zeo, and Runkeeer on the iPhone.

Chris’ wife has a FitBit, Zeo, and Runkeeper.   The kids wear Zamzees.  To say that movement is tracked is an understatement.

But where does quantity meet quality?  

What else might we measure?  

I’ve long been a proponent of measuring heart rate variability and galvanic skin response – which can indicate how relaxed or stressed we are.  

What about measuring how many minutes or hours we are not sitting in front of a screen?  How many minutes or hours we spend outside?  How long we spend enjoying a meal or how much we enjoyed a meal?

Does our current focus on measuring steps and calories keep us in a cerebral thinking and doing state, and distance us from being more wholly embodied, sensing and feeling?  

Do our current quantified self activities measure what’s easily measured or do they measure what really matters?  What else might we measure?

A Badass Musician & a Sixth Degree Aikido Black Belt Advise on Email Apnea

Watching Cameron Carpenter play the organ is a transcendant experience.  It’s as if he’s “lit.”  The organ just sits there, and Carpenter’s body exudes a powerful energy.  Most of us, when we interact with digital technologies, “merge” our energies with the device, exhausting ourselves.  Experienced musicians don’t do this. In the evolution of our relationship with digital devices, we have a lot to learn from experienced musicians.

So, recently, when a friend and I had a chance to talk with Cameron about email apnea (also called screen apnea), and conscious computing, and to solicit his advice, we seized at the opportunity.

A little more context first:

“Email apnea,” or “screen apnea”  is temporary cessation of breath when we’re in front of a screen, especially when texting or doing email.  This chronic breath-holding puts us in a state of fight or flight, affecting emotions, physiology, and attention.

Our opportunity is to evolve toward, “Conscious Computing.”   Instead of merging with or into the screen and our digital devices, we stay embodied, breathing, and separate from the devices, in the same way an experienced musician relates to his or her instrument.

Carpenter plays the organ;  a complicated instrument with complicated controls.  He paused for a minute before responding to us, then with complete confidence, advised:

“You’ve gotta dominate the mofo!”

The next day, I related this story to Wendy Palmer, who coaches leaders in conscious embodiment.  Her reaction, “There’s a gentle way to just let it know you’re the boss.”

Take your pick.

Point of View is Worth 80 IQ Points

During the years I worked at Apple, Alan Kay, a creative visionary, was also there.  Kay’s wise memes were often quoted.  One of my favorites, “Point of view is worth 80 IQ points,” is a constant guiding consideration for me.  It comes to mind when I convene groups or organize advisory boards for companies:  Is there a diverse mix of thinkers, personalities, and expertise represented?  It’s on my mind when I organize dinner parties.  In the years I spent working at Apple and Microsoft, it was on my mind when I made hiring decisions and assembled teams to work on any type of project.

In December, I ran into Chris Young, and as we caught up with each other, he related a fascinating, “point of view is worth 80 points,” story.    The story, Milk in Kenya, is below.

Milk in Kenya

For over two years, a group of engineers, scientists, and inventors had labored over a problem posed by a client. The client, a wealthy philanthropist, was deeply concerned about global health issues and poverty in Africa.  In particular, he had noticed that if the milk spoilage problem in Kenya and Uganda could be solved, it might be possible to break the cycle of poverty for small hold dairy farmers. Small hold dairy farmers typically own 2-3 cows, and milk is the primary source of their income.  Farmers wind up losing income because as much as half the milk their cows produce spoils before they can get it to the market where it can be sold.

The working assumption was this:  We need to prevent milk from spoiling.  This can be done through heating to achieve pasteurization.  However, this then requires that the milk either be refrigerated immediately, or specially processed and packaged in sterile packaging.

In conventional pasteurization, the milk is heated as briefly as possible, 30 minutes or less; just long enough to kill bacteria that would cause illness and not so long that it would compromise the fresh flavor of milk.   Along with the assumptions above, there was an additional, unquestioned assumption:  The milk needed to taste “fresh,” not cooked.

The engineers on the team investigated exotic technological solutions to refrigeration, thermal processing and sterile packaging.  After a comprehensive review of existing first world technologies, the engineers began to assess how to do ultra-high temperature pasteurization and sterile packaging in a new way.  Ultra-high temperature pasteurization, or UHT, conventionally requires steam injection, vacuum assisted cooling, and elaborate aseptic packaging that, then, yields packaged milk that doesn’t require refrigeration.

The team of engineers settled on an exotic technology that came out of the computer chip manufacturing industry:  the Tuckerman heat exchanger.  This is incredibly efficient and solved a lot of complexities.  There was just one problem.  Milk isn’t water.  As soon as the milk got hot, it fouled and ruined the heat exchanger.  Permanently.  Everyone involved was skeptical they could do sterile packaging a cost effective way.  The future of the project was in jeopardy.

Chris Young was asked to meet with the team.  Young, a mathematician, biochemist and chef, is a guy who wants everyone to love their food, and wonders why people like some things and not other things. He’s curious and playful, both in and out of the kitchen. Young and a collaborator had just finished a book and he had a little time free before publication.  Young’s boss suggested, “You really don’t know anything about this problem or project, but you do know a few things about milk, so go see if you can contribute something.”

The team asked Young to look at solving the milk-fouling problem for the heat exchanger.  The engineers were excited about the technology, and figured that if Young could make it work with milk, they’d have a solution.

Young had no pre-conceived ideas. He joined the team with an open, curious, and exploring state of mind, not attached to a particular outcome. He was not limited by what was known, and was able to hold what he did know, lightly:  maybe things are this way and maybe they’re not.

During a meeting with the team, when they were reporting on a trip to Kenya, one researcher mentioned that, in Kenya, people don’t drink milk by the glass.  People boil the milk, then add tea, and sugar.  The engineers and consulting dairy scientists had all assumed that milk needed to have a “fresh” taste.

Young wondered, is the “fresh” flavor really important?  If the milk tastes “cooked,” is that a bad thing?  Young decided to test the flavor; he cooked milk for longer periods of time and tested batches.  To him, the cooked milk tasted sweeter.

There was no scientific literature on the safety of holding milk hot.   However, Young knew that chefs around the world have cooked things at these temperatures for days at a time without spoilage or health risks.  Sous vide, a popular modernist cuisine food preparation technique, holds foods hot for hours or days. There was no reason to assume it would be unsafe.  Sure enough, when they tested the microbiological safety, it was better than that. It made the milk safer.

Young’s idea:  Why not just cook the milk sous vide, instead of pasteurizing it?  This process is less complex and less energy is consumed.

The team conducted sensory tests and those results are in.  Most Kenyans actually prefer the taste of hot held milk.  The solution is cheap – as cheap or cheaper than the current practices; and certainly far cheaper than exotic first world approaches, like the Tuckerman heat exchanger technology.

Chris Young was free to see an easy solution, in a situation where the experts had hit a dead end.

How can we think differently about team composition or about the challenges before us, taking into account Alan Kay’s wisdom:  “Point of view is worth 80 IQ points?”

 

 

 

The Hair Dryer that Got Away

Iʼm in NY and staying at a friendʼs apartment. Heʼs not there.

Iʼve had a terrific nightʼs sleep, a hot shower, and now, plan to dry my hair and head over to a conference, where Iʼll be speaking about millenials in the workplace. After my session, several videotaped interviews are planned. Iʼm figuring out what to wear.

I brought several things to choose from so I could feel comfortable in front of the cameras. I even called my friendʼs assistant in advance, “Do I need to bring a hair dryer or is there one in the apartment?” Caught without a hair dryer on a previous visit, I knew Iʼd need a hair dryer for camera-ready hair. She assured me I would find one in the apartment.

I check the hall closet for a hair dryer. Then I check another closet. And another. One more.  OMG, no hair dryer!

I start catastrophizing as I imagine my fine, unruly hair without a dryer. I go through the closets again. Every closet. Panicked, I call my friendʼs office. His assistant, Lesley, is helpful. Five minutes later, thereʼs a knock on the door. Someone in the building has a new hair dryer for me. Relief.

I notice the box is purple and looks familiar. I return to the hall closet. The box matches a box in the closet.

I had been looking for a hair dryer. What good is a box?

Laughing as I dry my hair, I wonder, how much is life like this every day? How many things am I looking for with such vigilance, and such absolute certainty, that, even when theyʼre right in front of me, I fail to notice them.

When I donʼt know, it’s possible to see.

I was so struck by this example of what is called inattentional blindness.  We fail to notice things in plain sight.  The Chabris and Simons website includes some great video demos; you can see how easy it is to miss what’s right in front of you.

One of my favorite books on this topic is Sleights of Mind:  What the Neuroscience of Magic Reveals about Our Everyday Deceptions.

For many of us, our evolving relationship with technology in a 24/7, mobile, always-connected world, traps us in a hyper-focus on the screen, and a blindness to the rich world around us.

Do you have a story about your own inattentional blindness?  Feel free to share it below.

Perpetual Inattentional Blindness

I first saw The Invisible Gorilla video in 1980-something (’87? 88?).  Alan Kay showed it to a crowd of Apple employees in a jam-packed auditorium, just prior to a talk by Tim Gallwey.

Experiencing the video was a knock on the side of the head.  Being chosen by Tim Gallwey to play catch with him on stage, in front of my colleagues, was utterly terrifying.  Then, there it was.  When he tossed the ball, asking me to notice the shape of the holes, I, a legally blind without glasses human, easily caught the ball.   Our game of catch was flowing perfectly, until my mind interrupted with an internal broadcast:  “Linda, you are catching a ball onstage, in front of 500 people.”  I dropped the ball.

My cognitive science background sent me to the literature, and, one of my favorite resources today, in the study of attention, is the work of Chabris and Simons, on “selective attention,” or, “inattentional blindness.”  Scholarpedia defines this as the failure to notice a fully-visible, but unexpected object because attention is engaged on another task, event, or object.

Then it hit me.  Our relationships with our SmartPhones, and this wicked habit that many of us have, of walking or driving while texting or talking, holds us in a state of perpetual inattentional blindness.

On a trip to New York City in fall, 2010, the real cost of perpetual inattentional blindness came through loud and clear.

Diary, September 2010

I’m in NY and staying at a friend’s apartment.  He’s not there. I’ve had a terrific night’s sleep, a hot shower, and now, plan to dry my hair and head over to a conference, where I’ll be speaking about millenials in the workplace.

After my session, several videotaped interviews are planned.  I’m figuring out what to wear. I brought several things to choose from so I could feel comfortable in front of the cameras.  I even called my friend’s assistant in advance, “Do I need to bring a hair dryer or is there one in the apartment?”  Caught without a hair dryer on a previous visit, I knew I’d need a hair dryer for camera-ready hair.  She assured me I would find one in the apartment.

I check the hall closet for a hair dryer.  Then I check another closet.  And another.  One more.  OMG, no hair dryer!  I start catastrophizing as I imagine my fine, unruly hair without a dryer.  I go through the closets again.  Every closet.  Panicked, I call my friend’s office.  His assistant, Lesley, is helpful.

Five minutes later, there’s a knock on the door.  Someone in the building has a new hair dryer for me.  Relief. I notice the box is purple and looks familiar.  I return to the hall closet.  The box matches a box in the closet. I had been looking for a hair dryer.  What good is a box?

Laughing as I dry my hair, I wonder, how much is life like this every day?  How many things am I looking for with such vigilance, and such absolute certainty, that, even when they’re right in front of me, I fail to notice them. What does happiness look like?  What does love look like?  When I have “I don’t know,” mind, anything is possible.

Can you recall moments of inattentional blindness? How do you cultivate an open state?

Suspending Disbelief

Everything we know, our strongly held beliefs, and in some cases, even what we consider to be “factual,” creates the lens through which we see and experience the world, and can contribute to a critical, reactive orientation.  This can serve us well.  For example:  Fire is hot; it can burn me if I touch it.  These strongly held beliefs can also compromise our ability to observe and to think in an expansive, generative way.

Every year, John Brockman, asks a community of academics and thought leaders, a question, and posts the responses on Edge.org.  This year’s question was:

What scientific concept would improve everybody’s cognitive toolkit?

My response:  Suspending Disbelief

Barbara McClintock was ignored and ridiculed, by the scientific community, for thirty-two years before winning a Nobel Prize in 1984, for discovering “jumping genes.” During the years of hostile treatment by her peers, McClintock didn’t publish, preferring to avoid the rejection of the scientific community. Stanley Prusiner faced significant criticism from his colleagues until his prion theory was confirmed. He, too, went on to win a Nobel Prize in 1982.

Barry Marshall challenged the medical “fact” that stomach ulcers were caused by acid and stress; and presented evidence that H. Pylori bacteria is the cause. Marshall is quoted as saying, “Everyone was against me.”

Progress in medicine was delayed while these “projective thinkers” persisted, albeit on a slower and lonelier course.

Projective thinking is a term coined by Edward de Bono to describe generative rather than reactive thinking. McClintock, Prusiner, and Marshall offered projective thinking; suspending their disbelief regarding accepted scientific views at the time.

Articulate, intelligent individuals can skillfully construct a convincing case to argue almost any point of view. This critical, reactive use of intelligence narrows our vision. In contrast, projective thinking is expansive, “open-ended” and speculative, requiring the thinker to create the context, concepts, and the objectives.

Twenty years of studying maize created a context within which McClintock could speculate. With her extensive knowledge and keen powers of observation, she deduced the significance of the changing color patterns of maize seed. This led her to propose the concept of gene regulation, which challenged the theory of the genome as a static set of instructions passed from one generation to the next.

The work McClintock first reported in 1950, the result of projective thinking, extensive research, persistence, and a willingness to suspend disbelief, wasn’t understood or accepted until many years later.

Everything we know, our strongly held beliefs, and, in some cases, even what we consider to be “factual,” creates the lens through which we see and experience the world, and can contribute to a critical, reactive orientation. This can serve us well: Fire is hot; it can burn if touched. It can also compromise our ability to observe and to think in an expansive, generative way.

When we cling rigidly to our constructs, as McClintock’s peers did, we can be blinded to what’s right in front of us. Can we support a scientific rigor that embraces generative thinking and suspension of disbelief? Sometimes science fiction does become scientific discovery.

 

 

The Look & Feel of Conscious Computing

With a musical instrument, it’s awkward at first.  All thumbs.  Uncomfortable.   Noise.  With practice, the musician becomes self-contained vs. consumed by the instrument; co-creating music.  So it will be with personal technology.  Now, a prosthetic of mind, it will become a prosthetic of being.  A violinist with a violin.  Us with our gadgets, embodied, attending as we choose.

Playing Video Games When the Power is Out

I haven’t always been a fan of video games.   I’m a fan of getting outside, enjoying fresh air, exploring tide pools, walking on a trail or in the park.  I love cooking, baking and crafting.   It just never occurred to me that adding more hours in front of a screen could be a path to joy.

Over the years, in over the shoulder mode, I’ve loved watching friends of all ages engage — with a full on passion and joy, and my latest HuffPo post describes one such moment.

TEDxMidwest

These last few months, I’ve linked up with Mike Hettwer  to create TEDxMidwest.    On a flight to Chicago now and super excited about the terrific speakers and great friends who plan to join us in the inaugural year of this event.

Special thanks to Chris Anderson, TED Conferences, for his vision and for offering a program for local TEDx events.   Special thanks to the TEDx team for their support, with a special shout out to Lara Stein and Ronda Carnegie.

How Did You Play?

This past weekend, at SciFoo 2010, during one of Nat Torkington’s Lightning Rounds, I had a chance to talk about childhood play patterns of scientists, of all of us, and about the benefits of self-directed play.  Here’s an earlier blog post on the topic.

Please join the discussion in the Talk To Me section of this blog, and share how you played as a child. Alone?  Social?  Both?  Were you a builder and a maker?  Did you create your own experiments? Did you have favorite objects?    Do tell!

Talk to Me…

Dee Hock’s 1996 Quote…

Those who have heard me speak know that I often quote Dee Hock, the Founder of Visa, and one of the great business innovators of our time.

I use his quote below to describe how technology is evolving us, how we’re evolving technology and how both are evolving culture.

  • Noise becomes data when it has a cognitive pattern.
  • Data becomes information when assembled into a coherent whole, which can be related to other information.
  • Information becomes knowledge when integrated with other information in a form useful for making decisions and determining actions.
  • Knowledge becomes understanding when related to other knowledge in a manner useful in anticipating, judging and acting.
  • Understanding becomes wisdom when informed by purpose, ethics, principles, memory and projection.

Further, I map this evolution to a timeline:

1945-1965

Noise to Data

1965-1985

Data to Information

1985-2005

Information to Knowledge

2005-2025

Knowledge to Understanding

2025-2045

Understanding to Wisdom

Today, we are Knowledge Workers evolving into Understanding Workers.  Understanding Workers use technology to anticipate, judge and act.  Think about it.  This is what we’re doing with FitBit, Quantified Self, 23andMe.com, Facebook, and so many other technologies of this era.

As we move into an Era of Conscious Computing, we’ll also be moving deeper into Understanding and closer toward Wisdom.

iPads Everywhere!

O’Reilly Media hosted yet another invitation-only, mind-bending, inspiring, fun Foo Camp.

In years past, we’ve enjoyed these unconference sessions, laptops glowing, perched on laps, on tables.  Technology everywhere.  Notes being taken, emails and tweets constantly flowing.

This year, Sara Winge pointed out, “open laptops were rare in sessions.”   iPads were everywhere.  “They sit flat on laps and tables, like paper,” Caterina Fake mentioned that and the contrast to screens as barriers between people.

People appear to sit comfortably, posture and breathing less stressed while using the iPad.  Some have specifically commented to me that while they notice they have email apnea when using their laptops, they breathe easily when using their iPad.

In the slow news session moderated by Steven Levy, Jennifer 8 Lee, and Kevin Kelly, the iPad as a platform for news and magazines was one of the topics debated.

It was during that debate that I realized — Apple has done for reading what the iPod has done for music.  We tune out the world, that 24/7, always-on world, once we engage with our iPods.  The iPad is the iPod of reading.  The world around us disappears when we engage with it.

The iPad, so gorgeous, with such a natural interface, offers the same opportunity.   Particularly in the case of the brilliantly designed (by Schulze and Webb) Bonnier magazines.  The world around me disappeared when I dropped into this iPad magazine experience.

I don’t have an iPad (yet).  I’ve enjoyed noticing the impact it’s having at various high tech gatherings as well as on less techie friends, many of whom seem to be making this their primary platform.

Conscious Computing

Personal technologies today are prosthetics for our minds.   Our opportunity is to create personal technologies that are prosthetics for our beings.  Conscious computing is post-productivity, post-communication era computing.  Personal technologies that enhance our lives.  Personal technologies that are prosthetics of our full human potential.

Read more…

More on Intentions and Goals

Thank you for the interesting comments and insights on intentions vs. goals.   In thinking about this today, I realized —

Intentions happen in the present.  Goals are about the future.

Where does behavior change?  In the present.

Where does intention come from?   For me, goals come from the mind.  Intentions from the heart, from emotion, from feeling.

Can one choose to have an intention or must it emerge more naturally?

How does this relate to attention?  Intention is the most powerful force driving attention.

Celebrating Sara!

A lovely piece about Sara Winge, who, along with, visionary, Tim O’Reilly, is a force for good in high tech and beyond.

While we’re at it, we can also raise a glass to Tim!

Thank you both — so appreciative of all you do for us, for the community, the industry, and technology as a force for positive change.

Intentions & Goals

How does an intention form and gather energy?  Is a goal an intention without the passion? Is a goal from the mind only and an intention from our entire being?

For you, talk to me about intentions — what they are, how they form and gather energy…

Thank you.

Kids, Video Games, Posture & Breathing

One of my favorite 8 year olds can’t get enough of his Wii.  I enjoy this child and hung out with him recently while he played his favorite video game.  He was hunched over on the sofa and I promise you, his breathing was undetectable.  With some coaxing, he moved to a wooden chair.  For the first 3 minutes, he sat up straight, then he smiled at me, said, “I like to slouch,” and continued his game slouched in the wooden chair.

Did I mention that this is how he spent his Saturday morning  just before going to an appointment with the doctor helping him with his ADHD issues?

Shallow breathing and temporary breath holding up regulates the sympathetic or fight or flight nervous system response.  I call this email apnea.  If your child has ADHD or impulse control issues and also hunches in front of a computer or video game or in front of the television, it might be time to consider an intervention that involves teaching a breathing technique that up regulates the parasympathetic or rest and digest response.

I recently spent some time playing with the HeartMath emWave Desktop software.  With short games, a player  manages his/her breathing pattern as part of game play.

At TEDMED 2009, Dr. Daniel Siegel mentioned research he’d conducted using breath training to manage ADHD.

Sometimes pharmaceuticals are the most effective option for treating a condition.   In many cases, for conditions involving impulse control, regulation of emotions, ADHD and other attention issues, it may be worth looking into options that help”re-set” the autonomic nervous system:  various breathing techniques, Buteyko, Feldenkrais, Alexander Technique, cranial-sacral, and certain forms of acupuncture.

Performance, particularly dance and music, often involve training in breathing techniques.  The same is true for certain sports.

The way we breathe is central in regulation of attention and emotion, cognition and memory, and social and emotional intelligence.

The Sunset of the PC?

Today, I don’t own an iPad.  Last week, I had no intention of buying one anytime soon.  The Wall Street Journal, All Things Digital, D8 Conference, has seriously cracked my resolve.

Lisa Gold, showed me her iPad a few weeks ago, and talked about her experience with the iPad:

“When I use it, I don’t have email apnea because I sit or recline comfortably, I’m relaxed, and I breathe. When I’m sitting at my desk, in a chair, staring at my computer screen and clutching my mouse, I’m physically uncomfortable and I often find myself holding my breath and feeling slightly anxious. Instead of forcing my body to adapt to the demands of the computer, iPad adapts to me and the different ways I want to use it. My iPad can’t completely replace my computer, but I find myself using iPad more and the computer less. And it has made me much more aware of how using a computer affects my body.”

More on The End of the PC?  here.

It’s Not the WHAT, it’s the HOW…

Recently, Nicholas Carr wrote a piece:  The Web Shatters Focus, Rewires Brains.

Can we really know that’s true?  It’s the web?  Is this a declaration of war on technology?  After all, it’s shattering focus and rewiring our brains, according to Carr.

My latest Huffington Post piece, Are We at War with Technology, considers the relationship between the WHAT (technology), the HOW (how we’re using it) and the human (us).

Parenting and Managing; Evolving Practices

I was surprised when a couple of Highly Regarded Silicon Valley folks, canceled a leadership themed dinner due to lack of interest.

Is this an interesting topic to the current generation of CEO’s and senior executives — especially those under 40?  I asked a serial entrepreneur, CEO friend of mine:   “Not so much,” was his reply.

Reflecting on why this might be the case, I started to think about parenting, and how very different Dr. Spock’s parenting advice fifty years ago, is from one of today’s parenting gurus, Alyson Shafer, in Honey, I Wrecked the Kids:  When Yelling, Screaming, Threats, Bribes, Time-Outs, Sticker Charts, and Removing Privileges All Don’t Work.

I’m still working through my thoughts on this.  However, I’m coming to believe that by looking at how parenting practices have changed over time, we can learn a lot about how management practices have and might continue to evolve.

For those familiar with today’s parenting guidance, and working in the business world — do you have insights and stories to share?

Are You Ready for the 21st Century?

In a provocative video, Michael Cartier offers a snapshot of four possible worlds in which we may choose to live:

1.  Consumerist

2.  Renewed Participative Democracy

3.  Environmentally Conscious

4.  Oligarchic Soft Facism (security state)

The video can be viewed here.

Thoughts?  Comments?

What is Dying to be Born?

A few weeks ago, when I checked my inbox, there was an email from Lianne Raymond.   Her request:

I am asking you, as one of the women I look to for thought leadership, to contribute your idea of “what is dying to be born” in the world right now- maybe it is already in the process of happening and you will shine the light on it – it doesn’t matter: whatever way you want to interpret that phrase is welcomed and encouraged, as part of the beauty of the end product will be our multi-faceted ways of viewing the world, with each view reflecting the others.

You are on this list because somewhere along the way you made a difference in my life through your words. So thank you so much for being a part of my life and growth, whether or not you become a part of this.

With much love,

Lianne Raymond

Click on the link below, for Linda’s page,  to read my piece on Presence in What is Dying to Be Born?

linda’s page

The link, What is Dying to be Born, will take you to the entire book:

What is Dying to be Born?

Mind & Body, War & Peace

I’ll be writing a series of posts on something that is troubling me — our personal and collective dialog about health.   We seem to be using the language of war, and our greatest opportunity is to seek peace.   We speak passionately about what we don’t want, and the joy is in the aspiration, the dreams of what we want, both for ourselves and as a larger community.

I come to this from a very personal place, as well as from a place of believing, that for all of us, nothing could matter more.

Shifting our language can shift us toward more powerful and positive possibilities.  I welcome your comments and stories here and on the Huffington Post.

Excerpt from the first post in the series:

I have grown weary of this American dialog, a dialog of mind at war with body. Mind always right, of course. Mind, the dictator. Mind, the jailer. Body, the servant. Body, the victim, of mind, the bully.

Read the rest of the post by clicking here…

FIRST + Dean Kamen = Inspiration

FIRST stands for: For Inspiration and Recognition in Science and Technology. By 1992, Dean Kamen was becoming increasingly concerned about our ability to effectively compete in business given our declining ability to educate students in science and technology. Kamen and his friend, Dr. Woodie Flowers, had a wild idea: create a competition–now a “coopertition”–where teams of high school students, working closely with mentors, design and build a robot, in a six week period, then compete both regionally and nationally.

Continue reading…

How has the Internet Changed the Way You Think?

The physical world is where I not only see, I also feel — a friend’s loving gaze in conversation; the movement of my arms and legs and the breeze on my face as I walk outside; and the company of friends for a game night and potluck dinner. The Internet supports my thinking and the physical world supports that, as well as, rich sensing and feeling experiences.

It’s no accident we’re a culture increasingly obsessed with the Food Network and Farmer’s Markets — they engage our senses and bring us together with others.

How has the Internet changed my thinking? The more I’ve loved and known it, the clearer the contrast, the more intense the tension between a physical life and a virtual life. The Internet stole my body, now a lifeless form hunched in front of a glowing screen. My senses dulled as my greedy mind became one with the global brain we call the Internet.

Read the whole post here on O’Reilly Radar or a slightly different version, here, on the Huffington Post.

Read John Brockman’s 2010 World Question Center.  Thought leaders and scientists respond to the question:  How has the internet changed the way you think?

Comment here — write your own response.   Happy New Year!

National Lab Day: Creating a National Learning Community

When Jack Hidary told me about National Lab Day, I got chills. The tag line for National Lab Day is: A National Barn-Raising for Hands-On Learning. Using the internet and social computing technologies, with the support of the White House and the business and scientific communities, National Lab Day reaches out to the education community, providing a tool set that brings context, community, and passion to education, and that has the potential to transform our educational system into a true learning community.

Read more….

Finding Ourselves Through Play

The book that had the most impact on my thinking in 2009, was:  Play:  How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination and Invigorates the Soul, by Stuart Brown and Christopher Vaughan.

It inspired me to chat with Nobel Laureates, last June, at a gathering in Sweden, about their play patterns as children.   When these men talked about their work in the lab today and their childhood play patterns, it was the same conversation.   They played passionately as children and the emergent questions and interests they had as children were still central in their work, albeit more evolved.

More recently, I started carrying a Flip Video recorder with me and interviewing friends and people I meet here and there.  One friend, Mike, talked about his stamp collection — the excitement of opening the bag of envelope corners with colorful stamps affixed, the thrill of tracking on a map where each stamp was from and learning a little about each country, and the sense of possibility and curiosity about a larger world with so many different cultures.  Mike went on to major in international relations and does global policy work today.

Matt Ruff was clear from the age of five that he wanted to be a novelist.  He read voraciously, invented imaginary worlds and has confidently and successfully pursued these dreams as an adult.

Over the holidays, sitting with my mom and little sister, I began asking them what they remembered about my childhood play patterns.  “You were into everything,” my mom recalled, “You had science experiments going in the basement with mice, you baked and sold cookies door to door, you were constantly crafting and making things, and you started hosting dinner parties at the age of twelve.”    My sister remembered the science fair projects, chess club, and all the making and building projects.

I remembered being positively obsessed with the notion of infinity and with Ann Cutler’s, Instant Math, and number patterns.  My dad was a willing co-conspirator in any building project — one of the most memorable: building an incubator to hatch chicks.  I had rock, stamp, and coin collections. I loved to bake and cook from a young age, and then found ways to sell my wares in the neighborhood — my mom always made me reimburse her for cost of goods.

Working with the kids next door, we produced circus performances.  I was involved in every aspect of production, program development, marketing, logistics, and pricing, for both the entry fee and goods sold.  We also organized summer crafting programs for young kids in the neighborhood.  I loved co-creating these businesses — with neighbor kids I’m still very friendly with today (no, not through or because of FaceBook).

By age eleven, I wanted to learn how to bake bread and didn’t know anyone who could teach me.  Trial and error and fifty loaves later, I could do it blindfolded and could easily modify a recipe successfully.  If I’d done this in school, I’d have gotten a failing grade after the first few loaves.  Thanks to my parents, I could try as often as I wanted and analyze and question what was going wrong and right each time.

I read voraciously, both fiction and non-fiction, and visited the library frequently.  As a child, I created books.  As a teenager, I wrote both prose and poetry and was the editor of my high school literary magazine.

I fearlessly rode my bicycle all over the northern Chicago suburbs — seriously, everywhere.  My bicycle was my freedom.  I sang with friends in high school and later in college.

I loved to travel and between baby-sitting and a waitress job that paid fifty cents an hour plus tips, I traveled all over the U.S. and to Panama, French Canada, and Europe, as a young teenager — on my own or with friends.  I loved meeting weavers in rural Holland, drinking my first cappuccino at the age of fifteen in Panama City, and picking blueberries just outside of Chicoutimi, Quebec, Canada.  People fascinated me – I wanted to understand everything about creativity, intelligence, learning, and communication.  I still do.

All of these themes are active today, both in my work and in my play.  I taught (K-6, university) and worked as a children’s librarian the first decade of my career, spent the next two decades in high tech, where I’m still very active, and this last year, helped co-found a fresh sauces and puddings company, Abby’s Table.  I serve on many Advisory Boards, both for profit and not for profit, covering a range of areas from technology to health to education to the environment.

How are your play patterns alive today, in what you do as an adult?  Once you start writing, even a paragraph or two, about your childhood play patterns, you’ll see the power of play.

I hope you’ll take a few minutes to comment on your childhood play patterns here.  What couldn’t you wait to do when you got home from school or on a Saturday? Does your work and play today share themes from your childhood play?  I hope this new decade is a decade where play is celebrated and acknowledged as the key to passion, joy and a productive and fulfilling life.

Screens R Us: When to Take a Break

Someone always stops me in the hall at a conference or asks anxiously after a talk:  How much time should I spend in front of a screen? At what point should I pull back and take a break?  Should I stop every 30 or 45 minutes?

My response is always the same:  How do you feel?  Your body is wiser than your mind in these matters.

The challenge is, most of us, especially the brainy future thinking high tech types, tend to favor the inclinations of the mind.  The mind, for many of us, is often tyrannical towards the body.  “Just stay up 3 more hours.   One more all-nighter.   A Red Bull or two and I’ll meet this deadline!  No walk until this paper is done…”

Our always-on lifestyle has favored thinking and doing.  As we move toward a lifestyle that seeks quality of life, we’ll find ourselves valuing sensing and feeling.   We see the first signs of this in the various food related movements that are gaining popularity:  slow foods, Farmer’s Markets, and preferences for artisanal and  local organic foods.

The operative questions are: How do I feel?  What would feel better?    These questions can help create a flexible, flowing workstyle that will enable the wisdom of both body and mind to come through in everything we do.

This piece also appeared on the Huffington Post.