The Red Pill
Posted on December 18, 2016“You take the blue pill, the story ends.
You wake up in your bed and
believe whatever you want to believe.
You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland,
and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.”
(―Morpheus, to Neo. The Matrix, 1999)
(*) Red pill: human awareness of the true nature of the Matrix.
We live in a fast and changing world, surrounded by complex social circumstances and wicked problems[1]. As a [future] transdisciplinary designer, I aspire to find the opportunity for social innovation and having a chance to dig deep in fundamental social structures, abundantly researching them to understand their complexities before attempting any change.
This statement is inspired by a few design principals that I have discovered are important, which represent core values I intent to build upon when approaching my personal design practice. They serve as a reminder of what is important for me to pursue as a designer. The common factor between these principals is the outlining the value of time, since I am highly interested in exploring how time can be a powerful tool.
PRINCIPAL ONE | Identifying our story.
How might we create spaces or conditions that embrace awareness? Can these spaces invest on time to build personal and societal identities? How can we reframe design interventions, so as designers we avoid interfering systems straightaway from the outside, but instead within and in long term scenarios?
I believe building or reinforcing identities is a core element in the design practice, for understanding human behavior and also how society systems works[2]. Everything can be seen from an identity-based concept. When we design a service, we reinforce the identity of that system, even the identity of the bigger system that holds the service (what it does and what it signifies). When we as individuals participate in communities or social media, we reinforce our personal identities towards others. When we face a social issue, like climate change, we face a profile scenario, which is a type of snapshot identity of what our world is going through today. Identities are a form of representation and representations reflect values, purposes, aspirations, a voice. And lack of representation appears through feeling undervalued, un-purpose driven, lack of motivation or lack of statement.
I strongly believe that when identifying the essence of a system identity (or lack of it) and people’s ways of being and living, a design practice can be mostly start to be effective because you dig down into the nature and value of an organism and find a north on how to proceed. However, there is the tricky part. I consider that the way to profoundly make a change and contribute with a strong design practice is time investing. A designer must devote the time to build meaningful mediations and understanding the system identity they are dealing with.
Western culture has a tendency to live concerned about the future and its multiple possibilities, yet not much preoccupied in giving space to present-day opportunities, and cherish the ‘right now’. I am interested in approaching design practices as an agent of change, through a systemic perspective, understanding individual and community based behaviors, that will allow me think how could systems be improved. However, to do so one must challenge our culture of rapid achievement and the constant rushing, because sometimes it is not about achieving goals quicker, but doing so in a more substantial form, even if our profit capitalist culture[3] does not facilitate this motion. We must find a way to coexist with the current system and achieve the elasticity of design project throughout long lasting lifespan.
PRINCIPAL TWO |Wonderland conservancy
Consider the scenario where we do make the time and space to endeavor long term design practices. Now, let’s zoom in. While trying to achieve our big term goals, there are smaller scale milestones that will lead you where you need to reach. The designer I want to be is one that knows how to contain the experience, knowledge, research and people interaction, among every key moment in the process. I have discovered it is not easy to know how to contain a moment, even a feeling. In the current rush-culture, it is not common to teach when to stop, pause and live the actual present. If this is hard in a personal level, imagine in systematic perspective while achieving project goals: we have a checklist, we work so hard to achieve that next check, we put so much effort to reach that next outcome, but then? It usually just passes by and we go straight ahead to the next goal. I am a firm believer in checklists, but I also believe it necessary to strongly incorporate in the design methodology, ways to go back, recapitulate, reevaluate and re ideate, and keep what you are working on alive.
[1] Jon Kolko, “Wicked Problems: Problems Worth Solving” book reference
[2] Donella H. Meadows, “Thinking in Systems” book reference
[3] Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams, “Inventing the future”
This principal relates to understanding the value of time in the sense of a feedback loop. In the sense that time in a design practice is just not linear or perfectly cyclical. I relate time in this case to evaluation and revisiting older milestones of the process at any time of the life span of the project. Perhaps figuratively finding the way of stopping time and going back, as a measure tool.
The theory is when stopping to observe and invest time into the ways and even sentiment inside a specific moment, you most likely can build up a more powerful and meaningful experience, than when rushing by different points in the timeline. I believe this to be important to be more perceptive of finding inspirations, prospective impact, creating value and uncovering what is needed to be changed. This would enable our mindset towards finding what is meaningful for each process and what the people we relate to need. I call this design action Carpe Diem imageries loops.
Which leads me to my third principal related to the issue of power figures.
PRINCIPAL THREE | Going down the rabbit hole and with whom?
Uncovering what is needed to be changed brings the issue of who decides what is needed to be changed. After reading the article by Bruce Nussbaum ‘Is Humanitarian Design the New Imperialism?’, reaffirmed the notion of how as designers we must be careful and aware of how we approach social change. Any social change involves people and communities, and as designers it is our duty to make our best effort in getting involved and making sure that our proposals are aligned with people and communities from within, and reassured by research and immersion. The power role must be distributed and flexible throughout the stakeholders involved.
FINAL THOUGHTS
In the first years of the 21st century, a third World War broke out.
Those of us who survived knew mankind could never survive a fourth;
that our own volatile natures could simply no longer be risked.
So we have created a new arm of the law: The Grammaton Cleric,
whose sole task it is to seek out and eradicate the true source
of man’s inhumanity to man – his ability to feel.
(― DuPont. Equilibrium, 2002)
This quote represents the absolute opposite of what I believe in. I stand by embracing our nature, its good and bad, in the sense of seeing the value in the good and understanding where the bad is coming from and trying to make a sense of how to move forward.
As a designer I aim to understand systems, understand their messiness, identify important key moments and learn how to contain time within these moments. To achieve together with communities, the empowerment of awareness.
– Javi Arenas