This TED video features an astronomer talking about the night sky as a natural resource and how we cannot lose this precious commodity.  When I was young I definitely came from a place where you could see the stars, and now that I live in more populated places the sky is something I definitely miss!  I also love the section about crowd sourcing scientific research, check it out and see how you can get involved!

Enjoy this TED video about redefining leadership in an everyday setting.  After watching this video, I hope you go out and create your own lollipop moments!

Through every change there is always a bit of nervousness about who the new coach will be.  What will they do, what is their style, and how will the coach us?  It’s always exciting to get into that first rehearsal and see how things will go.  Each change also presents that moment where the desire to lock onto the past and not want to move forward creeps into the consciousness.  Our three coaches have vastly different styles, and those differences have affected the development of our team.

After each first practice, I left the theater excited about the process moving forward.  In the land of improv there is always more to learn, there is always space to improve skills, and I am always looking to get better.  Studying under a new coach with a different philosophy on the process pushes the learning forward.  New activities, new games, and new flows.

Change in leadership happens, and it can be a scary times.  Ultimately it is important to thrust yourself into the new, and not let the nervousness hold you back.  It is really easy to be an impediment to moving forward, and not embrace the challenge and change.  If we hold back and prevent ourselves from engaging, we will never move forward and learn more.  Embrace the change!

Any time I get to see a TED Talk about positive psychology, I get excited!  The other thing that got me pumped about this talk was how funny it was.  Shawn does an excellent job of weaving humor and excitement into his talk.  I really enjoyed the push for positivity, describing how our brains work better,and  are smarter on the positivity pill.  Shawn also does an excellent job of laying out five simple steps you can implement on a daily basis to improve your happiness.

Wow, 200th post, who saw that one coming?  I guess I did when I posted the last entry and wordpress said I was at 199.  I recently accepted a job at the University of Arizona, and am excited to be moving back to the desert.  One of my goals in the upcoming semester is to retool and refocus this blog.  I have been dropping posts for the past year, and am excited to look at what I can do to take this blog to the next level.  So here I am in the next three weeks I am moving across the country, it’s probably one of the busiest times of the year, and I am making the committment to get back on the blog.  We are in the middle of the North Carolina Comedy Arts Festival, I’m finishing up my teaching tenure at  DSI, and looking at what is next for me in the realm of improv, and I think in any moment, I need this blog the most.  I look forward to sharing my thoughts with you!

Photo by Sarah Hoye CNN.com

You may think this article is about my glorious moment in the sun on the two person improv team, Robot Girlfriend, luckily for you, its not!  Actually, I’m going to talk about this article on CNN which really caught my attention.  It featured Heather Knight a social robotic scientist who is working with a robot named Data who does standup comedy.  Knight is working with the robot to teach it basic improvisation skills.  During its act, audience members hold up cards detailing their opinion of the joke.  The robot then scans the cards, analyzes the sound level of the laughter and reacts to the audience.  Those reactions could be a punch line as to why the joke wasn’t funny, continuation of the present material, or a switch up to other stories that might elicit a better reaction.

Computers acting more like humans always kind of creep me out a bit.  On one level I feel a little weirded out by robots that are humanesk, it’s like going to Disney World and seeing Abraham Lincoln talk and it just feels a bit off.  I also always get these crazy I, Robot or Matrix type visions of the world being taken over by robots.  Thankfully the article confirmed we are a long way off, if ever going to be in a place where that could happen.  I was comforted by the fact that all of the current computer power in the world, on every single computing system humans have ever created, equals about one human brain.  Whew!

I did really relate to the section of the article that discussed where improvisation comes from.  It’s all of the built up knowledge for out past, humankinds past, and we process that to make snap decisions in the present.  It also comes from that space between boredom and complete panic that we are fully out of control.  The article states, “improvisation can be thought of as a continuum between unthinking reactions and fully engaged playfulness.”  That is one percent true, the best improvisation comes from the moments when we don’t need to think and we are just reacting.  We feel totally comfortable on the stage and we just get to play.  It’s getting to that place of comfort and play that is the hard part.  I always tell my students they need to let go, feel like you aren’t control, and that is the space you will find the most control.  If you can do that, the funny will happen!

As a believer in the strengths philosophy, the ultimate question is what strengthens us and makes you excited to go to work, and what weakens you or makes you not excited to get started.  Teaching improv always gets me going, the whole day before I class I have a higher level of energy and excitement in my non-improv life.  It is pretty awesome to find one of those things that really gets you going and strengthens you.

Every time I move into the next level of doing something, everything seems to be moving at a faster speed.  The first time I was in an Improv Slam show, I got off stage thinking that went fast.  Same with the first time I captained the team or was in a harold show.  The more experience you get, the slower everything seems to move.  The same thing was happening while I was teaching.  Class seemed to move fast, I was nervous about getting everything in, and making sure I hit all the talking points.  During Monday night’s class, everything was running in slow motion.  For the whole time I felt in control, I was able to step in and give good side coaching, call scenes at the right time, and fully engage the group.  This all came into clarity for me when we got to the end of the class, and we were going to have a bit of extra time.  As we were processing out the last activity, I analyzed what was left on the schedule, rearranged the schedule and edited the activities, and we ended right on time, without skipping a beat.

While I have found the groove with teaching, I have also settled into a pretty cool teaching style.  While at the beginning I was always thinking about making sure I hit all the marks and stating all of the take aways, I settled into pulling the information out of what the class responses were.  I think it’s better to construct the information out of what the students are experiencing and allowing the curriculum to catch up with us.  I think the reason I love teaching improv so much is that it really fits in with my constructivist vision of how meaning is created.  The classes run how I think almost all educational setting should work, active engagement, followed by processing what happened, and moving forward with how to improve.

I am really happy with where I am at in the realm of teaching improv, and in the speed with which I got there.  Sometimes I think I am a better teacher of improv then and actual improviser.  It is really cool to give people a great experience in class, and to welcome them positively into the world of improv.  Hopefully my continued work in the improv classroom will translate into future success on the improv stage. Along with that, in finding a passion, it will be a consistent goal to find ways to continue to incorporate teaching into my regular schedule.

Over the month of December I instituted a new challenge for myself.  I plan to write three short stories based on a predetermined topic.  I have a longer based idea that I want to write, but I think I need to take a bit more time to work on my writing style and process.  So I thought the best way to start it off would be to break it down and work on writing in a smaller scale.

So wish me luck as I walk into this new realm of writing.  My hope is to keep up with the blog, and to keep publishing away, but it might again be a little longer between posts.  So it’s off to short story writing, and as I move forward and work on this task I hope to provide some updates on the creative process side of it all.  Maybe at the end of the month the finished product will be posted here!

When I get up on stage before a show, I am usually not nervous.  It can be stressful to make sure everything is together, warm up, get a show list together, and make sure the team set up for success.  But Before I step foot on stage, I always take a moment to remind myself, once we get up there, we are going to make everything up.  On top of that, if we are truly “yes anding” each other, whatever happens will be the right choice, accepted, and heightened into something worthwhile.

Tonight I was watching Arizona play basketball on television, and it really dawned on me how much the game of basketball, or any sport really, is so much like improvisation.  When the players head down the court, the probably have some plays or a game plan in mind, same thing for improv, then stuff happens on the court and the players have to react through their instincts to what is happening to reach their objective.  Conversely, each player is constantly reacting to everything that all of their teammates are doing, if someone goes rogue or starts breaking the overarching rules of the game, the whole structure breaks down.

Every day in our lives we are improvising.  Maybe we wake up with a game plan or a schedule, but we don’t have the script to the actual words we will say or the reactions we will need to make.  Constantly we are working off of and reacting to what the people around us are doing.  If we can see the patterns, building the connections, and make the best decisions, the scenes of our lives will end up going in a positive direction.  Sometimes things do not work out the way we want them, we receive some notes, and we get back out there and do it again.  That is improv, that is life!

The NCAA is creating a special event to kick off the upcoming basketball season.  In one of the most exciting and unique ways to play a sporting event, the game will be played on the USS Carl Vinson.  They are going to be creating a court and seating for 7,000 spectators on the deck of the aircraft carrier.  The event was created to celebrate veterans, will happen on 11-11-11, and to top it off President Obama will be in attendance.

My current institution the University of North Carolina will play Michigan State, and I am really excited to see this creative game take place.  To celebrate this week, I wanted to show the above video which features how the trophy was made for the event.  I love how even the trophy was created by a company in the northeast who builds the giant aircraft carriers.  So tune in at 7:00PM EST on Friday to catch this exciting and creative event!