Beans.

and other things that I find interesting.

Recent Ponderings

Some things I’ve been thinking about this week:


THE FUTURE
As much as I like to have things planned out, I am allowing for the next few months to be a complete mystery. An adventure yet to be defined. I recently passed up an opportunity to move back to the Texan city I love, in favor of some time to take a breath after graduation. And as nice as it would have been to have at least one factor of my future figured out, now I have more freedom to really go for something big.

It almost felt too safe to make a decision so soon. I’m craving a 100% brand new experience and I don’t think Austin would’ve done it for me . The post-graduation glow is the perfect time to explore and I intend to do just that. Oh, and land the perfect job.


MY PEOPLE
My friends all over the country are also making big decisions about their futures. I cannot describe how proud I am to see the people I care about making confident and bold moves to get where they want to be.

GENEROSITY
The incredible response to my thesis survey just proves how generous people can really be. At least 10 of my friends shared the survey with their networks and almost 200 people took it! I am so grateful.

PERSPECTIVE
A Short Lesson in Perspective by Linds Redding
This article made me really think about how I want to spend my adult life. It validated some of my hunches and made me feel better about my alternative approach to the career search. 


INDEPENDENCE
Thanks to my beloved thesis project, I’m starting to understand that working on a project all by my lonesome is really not my thang. When my two big projects go head-to-head, I usually end up opting for the one where other people are counting on me.


FOREVER A STUDENT
After attending the Portland Quantified Self meetup last week, I’m happily overwhelmed by how much more I have to learn about the world. Getting to see how other people channel their passions for self-tracking and technology was so inspiring and great motivation for me to keep learning even when I’m no longer required to.


SLEEP
I never appreciate it until it’s gone.

Data, Darling

This is an attempt to regain my dignity after the silliness of a few posts prior to this, where I pretended to know things about my thesis project. NOPE.

New plan: stop trying to say “my thesis is about…” I don’t think I’ll know what it’s about until I defend in May or June. Just wanted to clarify that.

BUT, on a more hopeful note, I have a solid direction. I know my project will have something to do with self tracking (or self quantification or personal data collection or self surveillance or whatever you want to call it). And so far, I’ve had a lot of fun learning about the movement and the tools associated with it.

In fact, I’m doing a little self quantification of my own.

I’m hoping to use the data I collect to better understand…

  • my spending habits as they relate to food
  • how much and how often I am working on my thesis project

I invite you to see what I’ve done so far by clicking around on my Daytum profile (part of which is pictured above). And if you’d like, feel free to check back and monitor my progress. 

Onwards to self knowledge through numbers!

Happy New Year’s Eve, everyone.

It’s been a busy and rewarding year and I don’t expect 2012 to be any different. Actually, I think it will be even better.

My goals for the year:

  • Raise my GPA
  • Exercise twice a week (or more)
  • Get better at focusing on one task at a time
  • Create less trash
  • Drive as little as possible/bike as much as possible
  • Manage my finances better through some good ol’ self quantification
  • Stop crossing my legs (it hurts my knees)
  • Kick ass at NSAC Regionals, create a campaign that the whole team is proud of
  • Successfully defend my thesis
  • Graduate on time (June 18, 2012)
  • Get a good job that makes me happy
  • Move to a new city

Cheers to great memories and exciting new aspirations!

poptech: 13 Rules For Realizing Your Creative Vision There are three states of being. Not knowing, action and completion. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done. There is no editing stage. Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing even if you don’t and do it. Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it. The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things done. Once you’re done you can throw it away. Laugh at perfection. It’s boring and keeps you from being done. People without dirty hands are wrong. Doing something makes you right. Failure counts as done. So do mistakes. Destruction is a variant of done. If you have an idea and publish it on the internet, that counts as a ghost of done. Done is the engine of more. (via fastcompany)

poptech:

13 Rules For Realizing Your Creative Vision

  1. There are three states of being. Not knowing, action and completion.
  2. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.
  3. There is no editing stage.
  4. Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing even if you don’t and do it.
  5. Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.
  6. The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things done.
  7. Once you’re done you can throw it away.
  8. Laugh at perfection. It’s boring and keeps you from being done.
  9. People without dirty hands are wrong. Doing something makes you right.
  10. Failure counts as done. So do mistakes.
  11. Destruction is a variant of done.
  12. If you have an idea and publish it on the internet, that counts as a ghost of done.
  13. Done is the engine of more.

(via fastcompany)

Well…

I’m not so sure about a lot of the things I said in my last post. After mulling it over and talking about it with a few human beings, my point of view is shifting.

New plan: think more critically before posting giant claims on the internet.

Data, baby

I’ve been reading a lot about data lately. Collecting my own meta-data, if you will.

Never have I been more aware of how powerful numbers are, it’s actually a little scary. Algorithms and regressions are often better decision-makers than humans. Who wants to hear that?

This book I’m reading, Super Crunching by Ian Ayres, is blowing my mind with examples of data trumping.

Equations that can predict which way supreme court justices will vote? And with significantly more accuracy than a panel of supreme court experts? Whoa. Read more about it here and here.

Freaky, yes. Ignorable, no. We can’t be afraid of data decision making. We have to figure out how it works as soon as possible. And then figure out how to make it do great things for us. We can’t just leave data crunching to the super nerds.

So that’s what I’m going to do for my thesis. Figure out what data means for our future. More specifically, our future in a society of mass communication. And for me and some of my peers, our future as mass communicators.

How can we take advantage of all of the data around us to help us make communication decisions? Correction: responsible communication decisions.

We, as individuals, are creating more data than ever. Data that we don’t really have control over. When we swipe our ATM cards, somebody (or somemachine) records the time/location/amount withdrawn. When we Google embarrassing things, somebody is keeping track. When we use rewards cards at the grocery store, when we walk by a security camera, when we poke our friends on Facebook…somebody knows. How can all of this information be wrangled up and put to good use? How can we use it to give people what they really want, what is really most convenient and helpful for them?

And how can we gracefully acknowledge that intuition alone isn’t going to cut it anymore? Perceptive analysis of qualitative research can’t be in the driver’s seat. I think this will be a difficult pill for communication folks to swallow, I’m not even sure I can wrap my head around it yet.

Also, where does personal privacy fit in to all of this?

Big questions, most of which I won’t be able to answer. But at least I can put a dent in them. Next up, The Numerati by Stephen Baker.

I can’t stop thinking about how amazing this picture is.I didn’t even know peacocks could fly… so much left to learn!

I can’t stop thinking about how amazing this picture is.
I didn’t even know peacocks could fly… so much left to learn!

Back in action

Let me first clarify that my month away from this blog was not due to heavy drinking, as my previous post suggests. Classes started and simultaneously, I forgot how to do homework, so I’ve spent some time catching up.

And now I’m back. NEW AND BETTER THAN EVER. I feel like a brand new woman. But seriously … I have some news.

My design internship this summer changed everything. I realized that design and art direction, while I love them so, don’t come as naturally to me as other communication skills. Especially in a full-time professional atmosphere with crazy deadlines and busy supervisors, design just wasn’t as fun or easy as I expected.

So there, I’ve admitted it: defeat.

It’s not easy to throw in the towel, but I’m finally there. And I feel so fortunate that I had the chance to try designing in an agency before getting a real job. Now I have time to work towards something new before trying to start my career.

“So what’s next?” you may be asking.

Strategic planning, that’s what.

Well, duh. Everyone already thought I was a planner anyways. But now I’m accepting it. And the more I embrace the title, the more I know that it’s right for me. I have always craved new insight and learning experiences. I have always loved problem solving. I have always been an advocate for collaboration and thorough research. YAY I HAVE FOUND MYSELF.

Hello, nice to meet you. I’m Rachelle, planner-in-training. Get ready, y’all!

Sorry tumblr, I’ve been busy turning 21. I’ll be back eventually, I promise.

Sorry tumblr, I’ve been busy turning 21. I’ll be back eventually, I promise.

Yes, you’re going to write some sketches that you love and are proud of forever - your golden nuggets. But you’re also going to write some real shit nuggets. And unfortunately, sometimes the shit nuggets will make it onto the air. You can’t worry about it. As long as you know the difference, you can go back to panning for gold on Monday.

—

-Tina Fey, in her book Bossypants


(I needed this last week)