Aug

Forty Days of Dating: A Relationship Experiment

by Sheron Long on August 1, 2013

Jessica Walsh and Timothy Goodman gain perspective in a relationship experiment.

Jessica Walsh and Timothy Goodman face up to issues in a relationship experiment.
© Osvaldo Ponton

Come Face-to-Face and Gain Perspective

Jessica Walsh and Timothy Goodman had a creative idea. Date for 40 days (long enough to break bad habits) and work on issues that had gotten in the way of prior relationships.

Friends for four years, Jessica and Tim are designers in NYC, people who take creative risks and enjoy collaborative projects. They have a lot in common, but—

Jessica loves the thrill of healthy, romantic relationships, falls into them perhaps too quickly, and is looking for “the one.”

Tim loves the thrill of the chase (often dating several girls at once), has trouble committing, and sometimes leaves relationships for trivial reasons.

With these opposite perspectives, Forty Days of Dating is a relationship experiment with potential for explosive results. Will the friends damage their friendship? Will they fall madly in love? Will they gain perspective?

Typographic art helps participants gain perspective in a relationship experiment

“Embrace uncertainty,” good watchwords for a relationship experiment
© Anisa Suthayalai

Getting Starting

For the experiment, Jessica and Tim set rules, such as seeing each other every day, visiting a couple’s therapist weekly, and filling out a daily questionnaire privately and with candor.

The 40 days occurred last spring, and now from July 10–August 16, 2013, daily posts chronicle the developments. Typographic art from friends captures the essence of each day, staring with Day 1:

Day 1 for Tim after a date the night before
© Roanne Adams / Roandco

Day 1 for Jessica: When an opportunity seems scary, I must take it.
© Keetra Dean Dixon

Insights Galore

Now, more than half-way through the project, the couple’s daily reflections offer a treasure trove of “Oh, I see” moments. Here are but a few:

1. On the Role of Exes—

On Day 5, Jessica and Tim engaged in “art therapy,” making word pictures about past relationships while they shared ginger cookies and egg pastries. When Jessica moved her exes out of her head, she found it “surprisingly therapeutic.”

Jessica gets an ex out of her head and onto paper.
© Jessica Walsh

Tim drew his dating history of 65 girlfriends and observed, “There’s something liberating about airing my dirty laundry.”

With 65 on his dating list, it must have taken time for Tim to air his dirty laundry!
© Kate Moross

2. On Why People Fall Too Fast—

A visit to a couple’s therapist on Day 8 gives insight on Jessica’s issue. Looking at the portraits of her exes, it’s easy to see that she jumps into relationships. The therapist explains and Tim, at least, has an aha moment: Jessica gets serious so fast because she dislikes the discomfort or awkwardness in the beginning of a relationship.

3. On Avoiding Attachment—

On Day 11, Tim gets crabby and starts pointing out Jessica’s quirks and weaknesses. She recognizes Tim’s behavior as a way to protect himself from getting too attached.

Jessica Walsh gains perspective in a relationship experiment

Jessica Walsh
© Forty Days of Dating

On Day 13, Jessica explains:

“As soon as he starts seeing a girl, especially a girl he really likes, he’ll focus on bizarre things about her that bother him.

“These things are meaningless in terms of a relationship, but he claims they are deal breakers.

“A few months ago he dated a great girl who seemed to have it all, but he decided he should end things because he didn’t like her shoes. Seriously.

“The next girl he said he liked hooked up with him too soon. The next girl he dated was amazing but she didn’t like her career as much as he likes his.”

The attachment issues led to the first fight, and soon the couple had to—

Not even two weeks into the relationship, things began to change.
© Sabine Dowek

4. On the Fear of Commitment—

Jessica reports mixed signals from Tim: “He’s both interested and scared to become intimate, yet he’s still being flirtatious and showing signs of wanting more.”

She starts asking more from the relationship. What does that feel like to Tim? He speaks honestly:

Timothy Goodman gains perspective in a relationship experiment

Timothy Goodman
© Forty Days of Dating

“I feel like I’m walking on eggshells a bit.” (Day 12)

“Yes, I am interested in more, but it just feels too risky.” (Day 13)

“I feel a lot of pressure from Jessie. I like a bit of uncertainty, and I like living in the questions. I don’t like having to live up to some idea, or to fulfill some expectation, though. I don’t think she even realizes she’s doing it. The whole situation is making me feel very unsettled, and she wonders why I’m being so wishy-washy.” (Day 14)

The pressure Tim feels leads to the wishy-washiness that confuses Jessica, and that confusion prompts the questions that feel like pressure to Tim. Ah, it’s a circle all about commitment. What’s missing?

What do the missing letters spell?
© Leland Maschmeyer

5. On Not Giving Up—

As in all relationships, things get really tense. On Day 15, Jessica decides to quit the project, but returns. On Day 23, Tim has had it:

“I’ve never felt more like a mouse in a cage being tested on against my will. I feel grimy. I feel very uncomfortable. I feel emotional.”

And Jessica is deflated.

What gets them through it? Intense communication and this realization:

Full hearts and broken hearts happen as relationships go ’round.
© Sharon Hwang

What’s Next?

By Day 24, Tim has decided to give the relationship a go. Jessica has decided to let go of her expectations. They have sex. It’s 15 days from today to the end of the relationship experiment. Find more of their candid “Oh, I see” moments at 40 Days of Dating, and gain perspective for yourself, too.

Jessica is a partner at Sagmeister & Walsh, and Timothy runs his own design studio.

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Sheron Long Comments

Secrets to Life

Jun

Plastic Alternatives— Yep, They Grow on Trees!

by Janine Boylan on June 17, 2013

pile of Styrofoam outside the Tokyo Fish Market, showing the need for innovative ideas to create plastic alternatives

Pile of discarded polystyrene outside the Tokyo Fish Market
© Daniel Calonge

Innovative Ideas for Biodegradable Plastic

Our world has become dependent on plastic. It’s in my toothbrush, my shoes, my sunglasses, and even the keys I type on.

And it won’t go away.

For decades, plastic has been made from petroleum, and, once formed into a plastic cup, packing material, grocery bag, or toothbrush, the plastic is here to stay.

Lucky bits of plastic may get recycled into new products, but no matter its shape, petroleum-based plastic does not biodegrade. That means, in some form, that plastic will be on this planet long after every single one of us reading this post is gone.

In addition, according to the Technical Research Center of Finland, petroleum-based plastic annually consumes about 5% of the world’s oil. And of all the plastics used, about 40% of it goes into packaging.

Oh, I see—we can’t sustain this!

Thankfully, innovators are developing biodegradable plastic alternatives, and they are turning to some surprising sources.

Fungus

College classmates Eben Bayer and Gavin McIntyre were fascinated with fungal mycelium, the network of tiny tube-like filaments from which mushrooms grow and get nutrients. They noticed how, when mycelium grows, it is so intertwined that it bonds things together.

mushrooms, illustrating a source of innovative ideas for plastic alternatives

Networks of mushroom filaments called mycelium help decompose plant materials.
© Thinkstock

Now several years later, their company, Ecovative Designs, develops packaging materials with mycelium.

mushroom packaging, illustrating innovative ideas for plastic alternatives

Mushroom packaging
© Ecovative

First they grind up local agricultural waste like stalks and husks.
Then they mix the ground material with water and mycelium and put it into forms, or molds, to shape it.
In five days, the mycelium grows around the waste in the shape of the mold.
Next, they dry out the newly-formed material so it no longer grows.
And then it’s ready for packing and shipping!

This alternative to polystyrene is not only strong and light, but it is fire retardant. And, once the materials have served their purpose, they can be easily composted.

This short documentary tells a bit more of their story.

If the video does not display, watch it here. Also, you can see Bayer give a longer TED talk here.

Chicken Feathers

People eat a lot of chicken. One by-product of this, whether we want to think about it or not, is billions of pounds of chicken feathers.

Chicken feathers are made of keratin, just like fingernails, hooves, and hair. And they are strong.

chicken feathers, illustrating an innovative idea for plastic alternatives

Chickens constantly shed their feathers, just like cats and dogs shed fur.
© Thinkstock

Walter Schmidt has spent decades thinking about how to use those feathers to make useful products.

And one product he’s been working on is an everyday biodegradable flowerpot.

How do feathers become flowerpots?

First the hard central quill shaft of the feather is separated from the softer fibers.
The fibers are ground into powder and combined with a naturally-occurring polymer.
The resulting combination is then formed into plastic pots.

The benefits are many! This chicken-feather plastic is light, can be heated and reshaped, and will not instantly dissolve in water. But it is also strong and biodegradable.

Best of all, the flowerpots can be planted into the ground where they will decompose and provide nutrients for the soil.

Schmidt notes, “Stuff floats around in the ocean [or] is mixed in landfills that stay there for generations. A far better solution is to make less mess in the first place and to have that material naturally recycle in a reasonable amount of time.”

chicken feather flowerpots, illustrating innovative ideas for plastic alternatives

Chemist Masud Huda (background), chemist Walter Schmidt (center),
and Marc Teffeau, (right), produce biodegradable flowerpots from chicken feathers.
Photo by Stephen Ausmus

Tree Resin

Chuanbing Tang is turning to the trees for his inspiration. He and his team are experimenting with evergreen tree resin to produce a plastic.

resin, illustrating an innovative idea for potential biodegradable plastic

Resin has been used for ages as a protective seal. Artifacts from ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome have been found with resin-based finishes. Today, it is used in varnishes and adhesives. But using it to form plastic is a newer idea.

“Most plastics from non-renewable resources are generally not biodegradable,” Tang said. “With a polymer framework derived from renewable sources, we’re able to make materials that should break down more readily in the environment.”

Hope for the Future

Oh, I see. Plastic alternatives, created from mushrooms, feathers, and tree resin, will biodegrade, or break down, making these innovative ideas sustainable.

Sounds like my toothbrush doesn’t have to be around for my great grandchildren after all.

To hear scientist Paul Stamets discuss six ways mushrooms can save the world and to see a mycelium network, visit “Livin’ in a Mycelia World.”

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Janine Boylan 2 Comments

Innovations/Making a Difference/The World's Entrepreneurs

Jun

All the World’s Got Gamification

by Janine Boylan on June 10, 2013

An Observation About Life

It was a Saturday like any other.

I started my day with a walk. I turned on my fitness app to record how far and how fast my journey was. My walk earned me fifteen fitness points.
I opened my food app to scan my cereal bar code and enter my breakfast food data. Not a bad calorie count to begin the day. The app shared that I had 1900 calories left to spend.
I loaded my grocery store app with all the exclusive “Just for You” specials and headed to the store. At checkout, my receipt showed that I earned a 15% savings because of my special coupons.
Plus, through my reward card, my food purchases earned me forty-five gas reward points. Added to the fifty-five points I had already earned, I now qualified for a discount at the gas station.
At the gas station, I punched in my grocery store reward card number and redeemed the points I had earned, saving twenty cents a gallon.
As I drove to the mall, I watched my gas consumption on the car dashboard display. I strategically stepped off the gas pedal several times and coasted to try to beat my previous record.

And then, I had an Oh, I see observation about life. My day so far had been full of points, rewards, and earnings. I am living a video game!

gas station rewards, showing gamification, an observation about life

The Name of the Game

Many companies use game-like programs to motivate employees or customers, such as group incentives to lose weight or energy consumption reports that encourage us to compare and compete with friends and neighbors over energy savings.

The concept of using game strategies to engage an audience has been around for a while. Recently this marketing strategy has earned a name: gamification.

Author and entrepreneur Gabe Zichermann clarifies that gamification “is taking the best ideas from games, loyalty programs, and behavioral economics and putting them together and using them to create engagement over the long haul.” You can see Zichermann speak in greater depth on gamification during this TED talk.

The Facts Behind These Games

Is it OK that our lives are becoming one big video game?

Game designer Jane McGonigal argues that it is. In a Wall Street Journal article, McGonigal says video games give us four things that we need for a happy life:

satisfying work
real hope for success
strong social connections
the chance to be part of something bigger than ourselves.

Playing a handheld game, illustrating gamification, an observation about life

More and more reports are showing the positive effects of video games.

Fredric Wolinsky and his Iowa colleagues published a report showing that playing video games improved a group of seniors’ cognitive processing skills over their counterparts who did not play the game.
Linda Jackson and team discovered that the more middle-school kids played video games, the more creative they were.
Paul J. C. Adachi and Teena Willoughby’s study shows that video games build “(1) intrinsic motivation, (2) concentration and cognitive effort, and (3) cumulative effort over time to achieve a goal.”

I’m Game

The fact is that gamification works. It makes the mundane more fun. Going to the grocery store, filling my tank with gas, or driving from errand to errand were never high on my list of fun things to do, but making a game of these activities has made them more appealing and, yes, rewarding.

So, my observation about life (with apologies to Shakespeare):

All the world’s a game,

And all the men and women merely players;

We have our points and our reward cards,

And one man in his time has many user names. . .

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

Janine Boylan 4 Comments

Innovations/Secrets to Life

World Views:

Topics

Category Archives: Traveling Through Life

Forty Days of Dating: A Relationship Experiment

Come Face-to-Face and Gain Perspective

Getting Starting

Insights Galore

What’s Next?

Plastic Alternatives— Yep, They Grow on Trees!

Innovative Ideas for Biodegradable Plastic

Fungus

Chicken Feathers

Tree Resin

Hope for the Future

All the World’s Got Gamification

An Observation About Life

The Name of the Game

The Facts Behind These Games

I’m Game