Quietness Experiment
Some of you might have noticed a period starting two weekends ago and going through about last Tuesday where I was substantially quieter than usual. I was trying a bit of an experiment to see if I could be both quiet and passive as opposed to loud and borderline aggressive. It was hard, but also quite eye-opening.
I started on a Friday evening and pretty much just failed. I would just be frustrated for a while as I actively tried anything in order not to talk and then I'd eventually let my guard down for a second (usually because my willpower was being drained at incredible speeds) and I'd be back at full volume imposing my views on as many people as humanly possible. Not great. Also, I got sweet headaches from the failed effort of trying to be quiet.
This would be that pattern for a few days. Eventually, with a great deal of self-programming (mostly by a hybrid meditation/self-hypnosis thing I've had going since high school) and force of will, my volume decreased. I started listening to what others had to say. Mostly, I tended to agree with what loud-Boris would've had to say on the subject, but I simply didn't say it. Sometimes, I found myself noticing that there was more thought behind some of the things others said than I would normally see (as they would've been interrupted before it became evident). I found myself enjoying being quiet sometimes. It started being classified as a default state. I met a friend's girlfriend and was introduced as "This is Boris. He used to be loud, but... uhmmm... now he's not... anyways, he's a good kid." Another friend told me that my default volume was not only lower than my old volume, but actually lower than the average person's default volume. I was feeling pretty proud.
In addition to the volume thing, I was also doing the passive thing. This meant lots of things. For example, I had to wait at the dinner table until someone left in order to leave instead of causing an exodus myself. Something I found rather amusing was that many groups had very solidified roles for people. Any group that relied on me to start conversations had incredibly funny awkward silences. To the point where one group spent most of a conversation talking about how they wished the other loud person in the group was there so that they'd have something to talk about. It was hilarious. Oh. And frustrating. Did I mention that? Anyways, this went on for a while and I was debating keeping it. Ultimately, the goal was to reach a state where both my volume and my level of assertiveness were things I could dynamically modify. But until then, I'd need a default. I was actually considering making it quietness. I wasn't going to do passive, but I though I might go for assertive and quiet.
But then I decided to go back to a loud default. Why, you ask? Well, I seem to be unable to separate out the assertion from the volume easily. I started being really unhappy with myself when I'd occasionally decide to say something and then never say it because I wouldn't interrupt anyone. By the time a hole in the conversation popped up... well - it just wasn't relevant anymore. So I'm back to old, loud Boris.
*sigh*
Maybe I'll try separating out assertiveness and volume again sometime soon. It seems like a prerequisite for the end goal of having full, real-time control of both of these variables independently.
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On an entirely different note, I've had a headache since I got home. I think it's because of a lack of pressure. It's kind of hilarious really.
5 comments:
Keep up the experiments. Jimmy RIsing led a group of us a few years back that experimented with a few ideas like not looking at clocks for a week.
Did that work? Like, at all? It seems like it would be totally impossible with classes that run at particular times etc. Or useless if you basically wait for other people who are looking at clocks to be your guides. It might be interesting to set up alarms for an entire week and only use those or something...
Could you let me know what the clock experiment set-up was?
Well it worked at changing my perspective.
You do use other people who are looking at clocks to be your guides. But that's not cheating. You can always do that if you want.
The set up was extremely simple: For one week, do not look at clocks. Still do everything you were going to.
The point being that after a week you'll learn to appreciate the ways that using the clock has helped you, and you'll pretty much forget about all the habits you had that weren't helpful.
There's also the philosophy that school isn't about showing up to class at exactly the correct time. Certainly don't be disrespectful and show up late all the time. But at the same time, it won't kill you to be early and to have some time to get mentally prepared for a class session. Think about why you're there in the first place.
Anyway, I don't think I've completely recovered from the experience (if you want to call it recovering).
OK. I'll buy that. IT does seem like it would be useful for getting rid of silly habits and maybe developing nice ones like getting to class early or something. Maybe I will give it a shot at some point...
The experiment that Grant described was when I (permanently, so far) stopped wearing watches, by the way. Watch-free for 4 years, going on 5.
I may try the opposite experiment sometime. I'm naturally an introvert. At my Candidates' Weekend, a lot of my teammates turned out to be extroverts. During the group interview, after we'd done the discussion topics and were going to do the team exercise, our interviewers said something like "and just for fun, try flipping your personalities around while you're doing this."
I found myself having to talk and make the first move for almost everything. It was very, very strange. It feels less strange now, but in unfamiliar environments, noisy areas, new people, and situations where I doubt my competence, I still shrink back into the quiet kid sitting in the corner. I should put myself into a situation where I'm uncomfortable and then do a loudness experiment there (and feel really uncomfortable, yay).
Another fun experiment: don't say "but" or "however" (etc.) for a day. For an even bigger challenge, eliminate "no," "not," and other such negations. Your sentences become all positive assertions. Strange wordsmithing ensues.
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