In my life, before and even at times during this course, embracing ambiguity and creative confidence had an interesting dynamic in which they tended to work against each other. Naturally, when undergoing a creation or design process of something, I grow a bias towards my personal work. After all, it was my mind that decided what course of action to take that would be best for tackling the situation, and so I hold a stake in those choices. So when it came to accepting others’ alternative routes of creation, I would look for ways to critique their work. It was difficult for me to be open towards counteracting ideas and to understand other’s mindsets. However, this course has shown me how both of these habits can effectively work together.
Embracing ambiguity played a significant role in all of the group work and exercises we performed this semester. Partnering up to share our mind map concepts allowed us to hear the opinion’s and insight of others. Even just walking around the classroom to view each others’ creations practiced a form of embracing ambiguity; we all executed the prompt differently and it was interesting to see other interpretations of the assignment. In terms of the mind-maps where their were several different iterations that progressed throughout the semester, observing how others modeled their maps proved to be beneficial in spurring new approaches to tackling the assignment. I begun to place a greater emphasis on the visual aspect of the maps: creating color schemes, emphasizes symmetry, and even displaying my drawing skills or lack there of. In some creations, however, such as the tea light or the key hanger, embracing ambiguity prior to designing your own creating was frowned upon. In my opinion, not having an example to work off of makes the assignment more interesting and exciting to tackle.
In these creations, child’s eye observation played a significant role. One might look at an empty tissue box and an old coffee cup and think, “how am I going to create anything with this garbage laying around in my room?” But perhaps a child would play around with the items and realize that the cup fits perfectly into the top of the tissue box. This is an example of how I manifested the child’s eye observation in my room creation.
Failing forward and creative confidence also share an interesting dynamic and can be tied to another habit that I feel as though the design challenge has encouraged: embracing change and adjustments. In my design challenge, I thought that I would be drop-shipping electronic accessories and reselling clothing items in a similar fashion in which my eBay store was developed upon. However, different shipping and availability conditions have transpired since my previous endeavors so I was forced to change my eBay project’s agenda. My new listings proved to be successful and have prompted another new development to my project; I now have more capital to invest and a new drop-shipping opportunity because of the changes I made to my original plan. This manifests the importance of getting an idea going, without spending too much time overthinking the design to get it perfect, because it will be changed at some point along the design process as you move from step to step.
This ties into what I have learned about myself through this process in term of failing forward. Although my sneaker listing hasn’t spurred much interest as of late regarding the item itself, I received a new partnership opportunity. In this sense it’s important to understand that “where one door closes another door opens” but that door will not open until you put your feet in the water.
In the past couple years, I have noticed that I tend to be afraid of failure, even in something as simple as speaking up in class. Being able to communicate with others effectively is a habit that, while not exactly central to MIDE 300, is crucial to group projects that entail the design process. The professors did a good job eliciting students to provide insights to the discussion. One thing I wish I could go back and change about my performance in class is not being scared of being wrong and adding more to the class discussion. I think this class proved to be an environment that encouraged people to talk. The presentations we performed throughout the course helped practice verbally communicating our designs. One way I am looking to practice this skill is by taking a public speaking course next semester. I am facing my fear of sounding stupid when opening my mouth by joining an environment in which my perceived act of sounding unintelligent is actually making strives to improving myself.
