Differences

This shows you the differences between two versions of the page.

--- michka:transiency_summary [2014-11-27 10:58] – michka
+++ michka:transiency_summary [2014-12-01 18:27] – michka
@@ Line 3: / Line 3: @@
 My year spent as a MacroTransient at FoAM is now over. One year of not being a student, not being an employee, not being unemployed. One year with no expectations. One year of incredibly pure freedom of action, movements and thought. One year to re-design a lifestyle, figure out tough life choices, defining a personal and professional identity. One year of careful help from FoAM to try to answer that crazy questions: "What do I want to do with my life ?"
-Below is an attempt to summarize this crazy year, and maybe give you a hint of how this feels, or even give you the will to go through the same difficult but rewarding process.
+Below is an attempt to summarize this year, and maybe give you a hint of how this feels, or even give you the will to go through the same intense and rewarding process.
-====Before this year====
+====Initial Condition====
+I had met the FoAM team in 2012, as I was an intern at Greenloop. I was in the last year of my engineering studies, and except writing my thesis
+I came for an apero, and found everything I heard and saw about this place particularly relevant,
 ====Winter - Decelerating====
@@ Line 144: / Line 148: @@
 {{ :michka:forecasting.jpg?400 |}}
+Between April and June, the FoAM Brussels Core Team guided me through the [[http://lib.fo.am/future_fabulators/transiency_scenarios|Transiency Scenarios]] process. This scenario planning process, fed by the works done by FoAM on this topic for a few years now, aimed to use futurology methodologies to understand better what your possibles futures are as an individual, and help you better understand dynamics at stake and make decisions on your life trajectories.
+At the end of the process, we obtained four scenarios representing extreme situations. Scenario narratives can be found here:
+  * [[:michka/scenarios/basement_researcher|Basement Researcher]]
+  * [[:michka/scenarios/passionless_expert|Passionless Expert]]
+  * [[:michka/scenarios/new_edge_hacker|New-Edge Hacker]]
+  * [[:michka/scenarios/edge_hiker|Edge Hiker]]
+Such scenarios can be used as a compass. Thanks to this work, I could better understand which of my decisions would guide me to one or the other futures.
+We also designed a masterplan of what to do from today on to reach the possible futures, which helped understand which actions I should start now in order to reach the future I want to implement.
+===Meditating===
+{{ :michka:meditating.jpg?400 |}}
+At our very first Transiency meeting, I was talking with Maja, Rasa & Nik about my issues of body-mind connection, and my focusing issues I was experiencing since the middle of my studies. At that time, Maja had advised me to go through the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindfulness-based_stress_reduction|Mindfulness 8-weeks course (MBSR)]], she thought it would help me with this. Her Dutch-speaking mindfulness teacher advised me a French-speaking one, and because of affluence & scheduling issues, I could only start with the cycle in May.
+It was worth the waiting.
+I remembered mentionning the quest for "inner peace" to Vali during our first session. This cycle was basically a course on how to find inner peace. With very simple meditation techniques inherited from buddhism, we would quiet, slowly but surely, whatever wind or storm troubling our souls.
+I felt more body conscious, and did recover most part of my focusing abilities. But I also managed way better with emotionnally perturbing events, increased my perseverance in unpleasant or tedious tasks, managed to get back to contemplation on a daily basis, and logically started to find beauty more frequently on my way.
+You may have guessed it: with coaching, going through this process was the most positively transformative experience I lived this year, and I cannot not stop being lyrical about it.
+===Getting Inspired===
+{{ :michka:getting_inspired.jpg?400 |}}
+In May, I was invited by [[http://www.evabakkelsett.com/|Eva Bakselett]] to teach in a workshop at [[http://schumachercollege.org.uk/|Schumacher College]], a mythical teaching place devoted to ecology I had heard of numerous times. It was a wonderful experience, mainly because of the incredible people I have met there.
+On the picture on top of this section, you can see two people. The guy is a former graphic designer. After three months of work, he found out that working behind a screen was not his way. So he knocked at the nieghboring baker's door and asked for an apprenticeship. He got accepted, and is now a (talented) baker for several years. On the picture, we can see him teaching how to make bread from a grain polyculture flour to a Horticulture apprentice from the College.
+And he is only one example of the amazing people I met at the College. And he is only one example of the amazing people I met this year in Totnes, Nantes, Marseille, Paris, Brest and so on.
+I want to keep meeting diverse people in the upcoming years. With diverse interests, diverse opinions, and amazing life trajectories. Because it is so pleasant & enriching, and it helps me so much re-shape my vision of the world.
+====Summer - Experimenting====
+===Researching===
+{{ :michka:researching.jpg?400 |}}
+In June, my friend [[http://zprod.org/|Paul Granjon]] came over for one week. Paul is an artist who works on co-evolution of humans and machines. Lately, he is has been dealing with e-waste a lot.
+We had a one-week long research workshop, during which we tried to build supercapacitors out of dead PC batteries.
+It was my first "technical" research experiment in a few months. Without having stated it very clearly, I think that I was in the process of escaping "technical" research, for several reasons. Mostly, I found research very frustrating. Trying to make something work for weeks, mostly failing, and having once in a while a bleak enlightment when something worked was not for me.
+However, reasearching with Paul was completely different. We had a very nice week, I learned tons of stuff, and even though we did not manage to have anything working as well as we wish it would, I felt it was very pleasant.
+I think that the combination of five weeks of mindfulness training helped me deal with the frustration inherent to research. But, also, having someone like Paul as a teammate for this project changed everything. We had very nice discussions, for instance on the wider context of the research we were performing.
+After this week, I was no longer sure I wanted to give up on "technical" research.
+===Connecting===
+{{ :michka:connecting.jpg?400 |}}
+Strengthened by the experience with Paul, I headed towards Nantes, and the [[http://summerlabnantes.net/|Summerlab]] organized by [[http://www.pingbase.net/|Ping]].
+This event aims at offering a temporary experimental space to researchers of all kinds, from writers to tailors, including programmers, furniture designers, or musicians.
+During one week, we would meet every morning to discuss what were the ongoing projects, and then we would spend the day working on them. Every night there was a party. Wonderful week.
+I met tons of people from diverse communities, and got people excited on the two projects I proposed: building a dynamo from a printer DC motor, and experimenting with microbial fuel cells.
+This event confirmed that the essence of what I want in this period of my life is: traveling, meeting people with diverse backgrounds & ideas, and doing stuff with them.
+===Wandering===
+{{ :michka:wandering.jpg?400 |}}
+I also spent some holidays with Amélie, and later in the summer with my family. During this period, I just spent time with people I like, contemplated many diverse and beautiful landscapes, walked, played games, and read a few serious books.
+During this period, I could feel the experiments and works of the past few months sediment deep inside, fermenting a little bit maybe, and starting to produce new flavors in my present and potential future life.
+Wandering is also very important. Spending some time far away from the daily routine, loosing some time in between, is vital. It seems that the new stuff I seeded earlier needed this stage for a healthy development.
+====Autumn - Preparing====
+After seeding, letting things develop, experimenting, and getting a few answers, most of the time of the Transiency had flown away. Now has come the time to prepare for the future life, post-Transiency.
+===Replicating===
+{{ :michka:replicating.jpg?400 |}}
+When an experiment is performed once, it brings a few insights. But to confirm these insights, replication is needed.
+I spent most of my autumn expanding the positive experiences I had this year. I went one week in Paris, for a symposium on Biomimicry, and another one on Technique & Degrowth. Then, I brought my microbial fuel cells to Marseille for the Waht the flok ? festival. Guillian Graves and I gave a talk about our Biomimetic Kettle in the European Center of Excellence in Biomimicry (Senlis, France) and in Brest. I went to Lausanne, to discuss a potential inclusion in a start-up, and enjoyed the NipConf. Finally, I brought the microbial fuel cells back to Nantes for a workshop at Plateforme C, Ping's fablab. Besides this, I performed some research on microbial fuel cells here in Brussels.
+All of these experiments were positive, and confirmed that I was heading the right way for my post-Transiency life.
+===Designing===
+{{ :michka:replicating.jpg?400 |}}
+I was left with the tricky part: designing the lifestyle. Now that I knew most of the components, how could I fit them together in an smooth way ?
+Travelling around to meet people and do stuff with them. Mostly people with low budgets. Keeping a freedom of actions & movement while still earning some money.
+The current hypothesis I will try from January on is the following:
+   * Most of my income may come from my work at a small start-up, based in Lausanne, and dealing with artificial closed ecosystem. It is going to be a very interesting job, in an entrepreneurial contexte, in which we will develop useful technologies for depollution, ecosystem restauration, and recycling. As I will most probably be working 20% (one week a month) in Lausanne, I will have three to four weeks a month free.
+   * During these periods, I will partly be traveling around to meet & visit interesting people working in "edgy" multi-disciplinary communities.
+   * I will also spend some time in Brussels, meeting the local communities here I did not take the time to visit yet, and keeping some days available to start new projects at FoAM. I want also to keep some time to read, and explore Belgium more seriously than I did so far.
+   * I will keep spending some time with people I like, both in Brussels and elsewhere, and some time wandering around, to let space for things to happen.