Design@Minnesota 2015

The thing is that when John had us do the active learning activity with the toothpicks and candy my team and the teams around us instantly started working and problem solving. We created various forms of communications and developed many team dynamics. It seemed like just about everyone was engaging in playful flow states.

This week I enjoyed the conversation about reflection on our work spaces, it made me think about where I worked and why I did so.  I spoke in class and described how I need to sit in the library completely alone and stare at a blank wall to get my work done.  I really struggle to do anything in my room, with friends or essentially anywhere with a distraction.  I have severe ADHD so I know why this is, but not being able to focus in a normal environment is very difficult for me.  I struggle with daily tasks, organization, motivation, etc.  It was frustrating to hear about everyone else who can study in groups or with friends. 

It was really hard for me to come up with the problem that I chose to tackle for the project one, but now that I’ve done one project full circle, it’s SO much easier to see issues or things that could be improved on everyday things.  My dad’s been having health issues recently and it’s been hard for me to see him struggling just to get around the house when he is typically such an active guy.  Coming up with better medications to manage pain, ways for someone who has to stay resting to get exercise or at least more stimulation than watching TV when they cant move out of bed.  The one thing that I’ve been really struggling with while taking this class is how I all of a sudden feel REALLY uncreative. 

Empathy in Project1 Selection

Empathy was what pushed me to decide on my topic.  At first, I was struggling to come up with something, I always felt like it was something super stupid or trivial and wanted to do something that would really effect my life, I decided upon cold feet and then about 5 minutes in realized that a product that could make the harsh MN winters a little more bearable for me would have the possibility to positively impact SO many people beyond myself.  

Active learning

I feel that something that I constantly have to do is active learning.  As I mentioned in a previous post a few weeks back, I have severe ADHD and learning, just in general, can be really difficult for me, simply because I cannot make myself pay attention for more than 5 minutes.  It doesn’t matter who is talking to me, I struggle to focus on daily conversation, in classrooms, while doing homework, etc.  

Evaluating Past Failures

I am the type of person who has a tough time deciding “what’s enough”, I tend to go all or nothing into situations, often throwing everything else to the side while I try to tackle a goal.  Something that I am very bad at is admitting when something is over and that it’s time to give up.  This affects my life in many ways - relationships, family fights, jobs, ambitions, etc.  I tend to go after something until it’s essentially mine or dead, haha. 

Relationship Between Relaxation and Productivity

I’ve always had a really tough time navigating the relationship between productivity and relaxation, I feel like my life is either going about 1000 miles an hour or 0.  It can be hard for me, personally, to find the steady middle ground that I feel like needs to be reached in order to be balanced.  This can make me be pretty negative towards myself because I realize that if I was better able to navigate this, I would be a happier more well rounded person.

I think that steps that can be taken towards making this happen would be to set a list of weekly goals, academic, lifestyle, etc.  By making myself have specific set out guidelines, even if they are as dumb as “get 8 hours of sleep Monday, Wednesday, Friday”, I would benefit greatly as a person because my life would be more organized, balanced and I would hopefully be able to think more clearly, be more productive and creative.  I find when I run myself down on sleep or life in general, I am mush less enthusiastic about everything going on and really struggle to commit 100%.

Tackling Diversity in Advertising

I think that the career I hope to have in advertising is an interesting one when considering diversity in the workplace.  Advertising oftentimes plays into stereotypes, gender, racial, age, etc. to target specific markets and people, and usually, there is a good response from the target market.  Of course, it is not negative profiling, but by targeting people in groups, there is a much greater chance of having a positive response for the product.  

Recently, I’ve been reflecting on the image I project to the public quite a bit.  I transferred here just this January, ½ way through my junior year.  It was not the easiest choice to make but I feel like it was the right one.  As I’ve become a part of the U of M culture more and more, I feel like I actually go here and am not just visiting campus, which is how it felt for the majority of the time since I arrived on campus… Kind of weird as it’s now been nearly 3 months. 

We finally wrapped up project 3, this was something that I really enjoyed.  I switched up teams and really felt like I was working with an awesome group.  We all were dedicated to coming up with a great idea and executing it in the best way possible, we were quick to delegate roles and had guidelines set for each team member.  

I would say this was my favorite project I did this year because we really worked to make a great project and presentation.  I don’t really have anything negative to say, we did great group work in class, but because of schedule conflicts, we couldn’t meet outside of class. We still managed to have a great project and it came together very well through online communication.  

In our presentation, I think we were a little tripped up by the timing change that happened, we had completed the project and created our presentation prior to the change so when that happened, we struggled to fit all the information we intended into our presentation and ended up stumbling a little bit.