Doodle

As an example of the former, last spring I discovered the scheduling program Doodle so I could simplify the process of setting up multiple meetings per week. Rather than collecting and organizing the schedules of a dozen colleagues for each meeting through email, the online solution Doodle does all that for me. All I do is post a few times when I am available for a meeting, send out the link, and others indicate when they can meet. A visual picture quickly forms of when the meeting can take place and scheduling is done. As an additional benefit, because people can see the entries ahead of their own, subsequent responses are influenced toward mutually agreeable times.

iPad for School Counseling

One of the things I was bothered by during discussions with students was having to frequently disrupt the flow of conversation to gather around my computer when the discussion required us to go online to show look at a video or something else relevant to the topic at hand. With an iPad in my office, I can open up Safari and we can pass media back and forth very comfortably and naturally as a digital extension of the conversation.

Sometimes, I am the one who wants to share an illustration with a student to help them think over an issue in a different manner. The iPad is for me in counseling what the projector is for a classroom teacher. I use both Drop Box and Evernote to wirelessly share information between my computer, smart phone, and iPad. As I prepare for sessions with students, I can save images, poems, and other resources into drop box and have it literally in hand the next instant to share with students – no printing required.

An unanticipated benefit of the iPad for counseling occurs during classroom observations. I know that if I am in a class completing an observation and typing up my observation notes directly into my laptop, it looks and feels like I am only partially in the room. I think many would agree that when someone is working on a computer it always looks like they are doing something else. With an ipad, it is far less invasive as I jot down quick notes into a much smaller device and black out the screen instantly so I can leave it where I was and walk around the room. While this may change in time, I don’t think people consider the iPad a device for “serious work” so I don’t think it fosters the same “analysis paralysis” that can inhibit accurate observations as students censor what they do and say.

The Next Frontier

Just this week I picked up an application for the ipad called “WebPad” that enables people to draw and illustrate much like finger painting right on the screen. In turn this illustration can be shared (in real time), saved, and stored. I don’t have much of an Art Therapy background but I see enormous potential in this app for work with younger children or even older students and adults who find visual expression more accessible. I can also see WebPad  making it easier for people to share names or words that they may have trouble saying by simply scribbling it out with their finger.

Limitations

Even with the docking keyboard, the iPad is not going to replace my computer for much of the record keeping or work I need to do as part of case management. The creation of longer documents or complicated tasks such as editing Google Docs, entering information into our FileMaker Pro database or creating presentations are either not it’s forte or simply not possible with this device. However, as a piece of equipment that can dramatically impact the quality of counseling interactions with students, the iPad has already made a significant difference in my daily counseling practice and I look forward to where it leads me next. – AC

Like many others I am working on finishing my masters degree. As such, there is a heap of required reading much of which is in the form of academic journals in pdf. Due to the design of my program, I am carrying two courses at present which is a nightmare at the end of the school year not to mention two small children and a high need for physical exercise. I regularly struggled to get the reading done then I had an idea about using technology for the visually impaired for my own gain and found Ghostreader.

This program simply converts text files to audio mp3 files to play on my blackberry or ipod to listen to as I wash dishes, drive, or walk the dog. It is sophisticated enough to phrase words and sentences naturally (listen to the file). It makes long academic journals or any other text you don’t have time to read accessible. When I am really exhausted and my mind tends to wander, I find I can study later and with more focus if I play the audio and read the pdf along with it.

Ideally I wouldn’t need this but like many I am stretched too thin. This program has given me back not minutes but hours of sleep. It has a free 2 week trial and is only $50 if you decide it is useful for you.

Scene from my daily run in Yamanashi

When I was on faculty at Hopkins School in New Haven, CT, I worked with a guy called Dean Nicholson. He was an avid NORBA Masters class racer and 15 years later probably still is. At the tender age of 24 he taught me to schedule an appointment with myself every day. I still remember him giving me an overview of the strategy.

Think about it, he said. If people call up and ask if they can meet you at 1pm and you have a conflicting appointment, it is easily accepted when tell them you aren’t available – after all you have a conflicting appointment. The same thing doesn’t hold if you tell them, ’sorry I can’t make it, I’m going cycling, running, or climbing’ take your pick. None of those reasons fly. People take offense to being turned down so you can work out. Why is that so? Why are we any less important than other people? The solution is to schedule in an immovable appointment with yourself.

Don’t tell anyone what you’re doing and honor it as if it were an appointment with the dean of faculty from Yale University. You wouldn’t miss an appointment with an administrator from Yale and why are they any more important than you are.

Dean was a very fit and very wise man. I haven’t forgotten his words and in this self-change project I have taken “the appointment with yourself idea” further with Prestwich, Perugini, and Hurling’s (2009) smart-phone reminders.

Everyday I get a message on my phone thanks to google calendar and google sync for blackberry that corresponds to an open block of time. Depending on the time availability and location I either do a simple workplace stretch or a more full-blown flexibility workout. Also included in these messages are various motivational phrases such as Tommy Lasorda’s

“The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person’s determination.”

Dean gave me an easy to implement tip on facilitating determination. Google Calendar and Blackberry makes is easy to remember and even lets me know if I try to schedule something over one of my workouts with the simple phrase, “Conflict with another appointment on this calendar”. This is every bit as matter of fact and firm as Dean would have loved to see. I’d like to write more on the topic but I have another appointment.

Prestwich, A., Perugini, M., & Hurling, R. (2009). Can the effects of implementation intentions on exercise be enhanced using text messages?.

The Before and After Speaks for Itself

As a slightly tech addicted docomo customer I wanted to keep the rock solid signal docomo provides even in the hinterlands of Japan. As the negotiations began back a few years ago between Apple and the mobile service providers in this country, I watched in dismay as they set up something with softbank. I spend a good portion of the year out in the countryside and am well aware of the softbank customer disclaimer, “I’ll see if I can get a signal and call you when I get there.”

I waited for iphone to get set-up with docomo. There were rumors but nothing happened…so I waited some more and waited a few months more until I couldn’t take not having a smart phone anymore. One chilly evening in December I found myself in Yodabashi Camera buying a blackberry and switching over my account from the pricey Sharp 906i touchscreen mobile with a 5mg digi cam I had been using. Over fancy camera features, I wanted wifi. I wanted to sync with my google calendar, contacts, and gmail. I wanted to stop beating my way through the Japanese language only i-mode websites and have full web browsing. I wanted a twitter app, wordpress app, evernote app, and flickr app. Basically I wanted my phone to catch up to web 2.0.

I’m a big mac fan and a sucker for the bells, whistles, and endless app options for the iphone but I am having a great time with this blackberry bold. While I imagine I’d get used to the iphone touchscreen, the tactile nature of the keyboard is a real bonus. I have also found enough available for me to get it to do almost everything I want it to, including sync podcasts from itunes. I am more than a bit annoyed with how long it is taking Skype and RIM to come out with Skype for blackberry but it probably won’t be too much longer now.

While I like it’s overall appearance, I did find the full black look a little unimaginative. Coveroo out of San Francisco, California has a whole heap of battery cover solutions to pimp out a blackberry. Mine now resembles something of a college dorm tapestry which I’m pretty happy with. It’s not an iphone but I love this device and in addition to all the web 2.0 stuff, it does radical things like make phone calls wherever I happen to be.

Basics – You put in a question and Aardvark sends it out to people who can help you. On the flip side of that, what are you an expert in? Aardvark also enables you to help people with questions that you know the answers to. It basically relies on that age-old joy of helping people out and maybe to a degree showing off what you know. After all, most everyone likes to at least be asked…

I’ve been working with aardvark for about 6 months and it isn’t invasive. I get a question every week or two and I try to respond intelligently. I claim not to know much but I know something about living in Japan (having been here 9 years) and a bit about fitness. Most of my questions seem to fall into those two niches and the answers aren’t hard to come up with.

So today I got this question from a guy in the US. “”What’s the best way to get rid if man-boobs sans surgery? Push-ups? And if so which form works best?” Tell me your heart doesn’t go out to a dude trying to rid himself of man-boobs so I wrote back.

Dear Aardvark,

There are no magic pills for this. Push-ups will make the muscle underneath whatever fat you are storing stronger but won’t address the issue directly. This is a common misconception in fitness like doing sit-ups to get rid of belly fat.

There are a few things to know…

One is that everyone’s body stores excess energy in fat. You actually need it because the human body can only store approx 800 calories in the blood. Everyone’s body stores fat in different places. For some guys this results in a big ole beer belly, back fat, or for others man-boobs. What you need to do is get your metabolism up (try cycling for burning off calories, hard to beat it), help your body burn off the fat by staying hydrated (drink water), and eat less food/more often like 6 small meals a day of modest portions ie not putting in enough calories in a single sitting where you body will need to store it in fat.

Then work on building some muscle tone like doing push-ups or sit-ups or lifting weights whatever. Muscle tissue burns energy just sitting there so not only will the exercise it takes to build muscle burn calories but having better muscle tone will enable you to burn more energy even when you aren’t doing anything at all.

Those efforts combined will get rid of the man-boobs, bro. Good luck.

In return, I get the satisfaction of helping a stranger during my morning break at work and will probably take my own advice and get out for ride after work.

Click to join Aardvark

One potential impact this holds for counselling is that we are possibly more attuned to each others’ subtle shifts in mood but further removed from an actual experience of each other. This mode of existence may leave a therapeutic domain that relies on such fundamentals as empathy and understanding deficient in the millions of opportunities to practice and hone these skills.

Bergum & Dossetor (2005) proposed that:

While not obvious in this short quotation, this comment was primarily a response to a detached pathological view of therapy work. I offer that it is also a useful response to an expanding interpersonal culture with increasing rates of interaction but arguably decreasing intimacy. To me, the idea of deep and meaningful interaction is akin to “presence” as pointed to over two thousand years ago by the questions of Lao Tsu in the Tao-Te-Ching.



Can you coax your mind from its wandering
 and keep to the original oneness?
Can you let your body become
 supple as a newborn child’s?
Can you cleanse your inner vision
 until you see nothing but the light?
Can you love people and lead them
 without imposing your will?
Can you deal with the most vital matters
 by letting events take their course?
Can you step back from you own mind
 and thus understand all things?

Counsellors must work to be more and more helpful amidst a decline of certain forms of intimacy.  A look at modern day idea of embodiment against a backdrop of a Taoist interpretation of presence offers us meaningful direction and insight into where we should be placing our emphasis.

Bergum, V.,  & Dossetor, J. (2005). Relational ethics: The full meaning of respect. Hagerstown, MD: University Publishing Group.

Lao, T. (1995). Tao-Te-Ching (S. Mitchell, trans) Retrieved June 01, 2009 from Academic Brooklyn, academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu: http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/core9/phalsall/texts/ taote-v3.html. (Original work published 6th Century BC)

This photo post is the product of a new tool I am trying out. First it was introduced to me by Brian Lockwood our IT Director at school. It is really very cool so he deserves all kinds of credit for spreading the word on this. This free product enables you to send photos via e-mail to be instantly uploaded to your various blogs, tweets, and via flickr to facebook pages etc. Incredible!

The site is www.posterous.com you create a free account using your mobile phone e-mail address (if you want to send images from your phone to everything).

Posterous recognizes your mail addy and automatically downloads attached files which it in turn is set-up to forward to your different blogs and profile pages. It is dead simple and works!

Next I want to try out some text and see where that gets me…

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As a group we have met on and off over the past several years beginning in a now demolished bagel shop in Futako Tamagawa with a most recent session…click to read more