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Friday, June 10, 2011
I attended a workshop on campus today - the presenters were very expert, had tons of handouts, slides and other supporting materials, it was clear they had put a great deal of thought into planning the workshop, setting the agenda, describing the desired outcomes and telling the participants what materials to bring with them to maximize the experience.
The only trouble was, once we had heard the presentation and were supposed to apply the information, most of the participants seemed to be confused, not sure what to do, not even sure which questions to ask in some cases, and many of us were quite skeptical about what we were being asked to do. I sat with my department members and all of us left feeling like we had wasted our time this morning.
So what happened? Well, the organizers had tried to do waaaaay too much for a short time and presented the material well but didn't leave enough time for us to absorb and apply it to what we needed to do. When we asked questions, a few were answered and then they turned away all other questions, assuring us that it would all make sense once we started doing it.
But I didn't really know what I was supposed to do and I found their worksheets confusing, awkward, inefficient and not really conducive to reaching the goal. So I felt a little frustrated and decided I'd just have to figure it out for myself and made better headway 'doing my own thing' on my own computer, which seemed to upset the organizers who wanted me to work with pen and paper - in their way of seeing things, I was supposed to print out what was on my computer, then copy it by hand onto their forms, then copy part of what I created on the first form onto the second form, then after several iterations and forms later, I could type it back into the computerized format.
Hmmm, I decided to 'cut to the chase' and work directly on the final product. I did get some of it done but in the process, a 'light bulb' went off in my head and I realized this is a very familiar story. Try this out:
We find a miracle diet program that assures us that as long as we eat X, Y and Z and do 1, 2 and 3 then we will be able to lose XX number of pounds in a week, month or some other time period such as '17 days' - so we try to follow this complex program so we can lose the weight as quickly as possible, setting unrealistic goals like losing 50 lbs in 5 or 10 weeks, etc. It turns out to be more confusing and complex than it seemed with the presentation, often turns out to be more time-consuming than we anticipated it would be and we soon give up, either to return to our 'old ways' or to 'do our own thing' with another program.
Or - we might stumble onto a program like SparkPeople which is structured but flexible, has tons of great information but we can work at our own pace on achieving our goals. And there is lots of support available, people to answer our questions and experts to help us figure out how to apply the information to our own personal circumstances, challenges and goals.
So as it turns out, I really did accomplish something very important at this morning's workshop - even though it really had nothing to do with the officially stated purpose.
Funny how things turn out, huh??
PS - Check out the DailySpark blog article about getting The Spark book in Kindle format for only $1.99 during the next week from Amazon.com - in case you didn't know, you don't need a Kindle machine to read books in that format - you can download a free 'Kindle for PC' program and read it on your computer - or get 'Kindle for Blackberry' or any of several other smart phones and read it that way - once you pay for a Kindle format book, you can load it onto several machines. I have some of my Kindle format books on an actual Kindle plus my PC plus my Blackberry so I can read them wherever I am [I'm surprised how handy having it on my phone can be for those times when I'm waiting unexpectedly for something - and it's easier to read than I ever imagined it would be, too, even with my 'old lady eyes'!!] - so getting the electronic version, even if you already have the printed version, can be a super alternative - especially at $1.99!! Wow!!!
Thursday, June 09, 2011
Just wanted to say good night to all my SparkFriends - hope everyone has a great night's sleep!!
Wednesday, June 08, 2011
I had one of those days where nothing actually went as planned - not all in a bad way but just a day full of twists and turns. I had some good times, some laughs, a few tears when I found out my friend's dog had died - it actually hit me harder than I thought it would since we knew he had cancer and at his age, the prognosis wasn't great - he actually had chemo and all his hair fell out, poor baby. But when I heard the news, I took it harder than I thought I would, although in a strange way it 'felt' almost like he was still there but just in another room.
I got a lot of mundane chores done and ended the day by buying a beach cruiser bike, something that's been on my mind for awhile [it's a Southern California thing, I think] - I've been shopping around at thrift stores, looking at craigslist, etc, but decided to get a new one at Target for $100. It's bright yellow and looks very 'cheerful' - I'm looking forward to riding around on it, in part because it's a simple bike - only one gear, no hand-brakes [just pedal brakes] - in other words, just like the kind of bike I used to ride when I was a little kid. To be honest, I have never really mastered shifting gears on my other bikes so having nothing to shift is a relief, haha! Anyway, I'm looking forward to riding it and might even keep it down at DH's family's beach house so I can just go down there and 'cruise the beach' this summer ;-)
Now I need to find a super-big basket so Princess can go with me - she can run alongside me for awhile but if we go for more than a short distance, she'll want to ride the rest of the way, I'm sure.
Hope everyone had a great day!!!
Wednesday, June 08, 2011
I had one of those days where nothing actually went as planned - not all in a bad way but just a day full of twists and turns. I had some good times, some laughs, a few tears when I found out my friend's dog had died - it actually hit me harder than I thought it would since we knew he had cancer and at his age, the prognosis wasn't great - he actually had chemo and all his hair fell out, poor baby. But when I heard the news, I took it harder than I thought I would, although in a strange way it 'felt' almost like he was still there but just in another room.
I got a lot of mundane chores done and ended the day by buying a beach cruiser bike, something that's been on my mind for awhile [it's a Southern California thing, I think] - I've been shopping around at thrift stores, looking at craigslist, etc, but decided to get a new one at Target for $100. It's bright yellow and looks very 'cheerful' - I'm looking forward to riding around on it, in part because it's a simple bike - only one gear, no hand-brakes [just pedal brakes] - in other words, just like the kind of bike I used to ride when I was a little kid. To be honest, I have never really mastered shifting gears on my other bikes so having nothing to shift is a relief, haha! Anyway, I'm looking forward to riding it and might even keep it down at DH's family's beach house so I can just go down there and 'cruise the beach' this summer ;-)
Now I need to find a super-big basket so Princess can go with me - she can run alongside me for awhile but if we go for more than a short distance, she'll want to ride the rest of the way, I'm sure.
Hope everyone had a great day!!!
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