Kate Krontiris

30 New Things, Day 29. Reflect, and then conspire.

A professor whose work and work ethic I admire hosts faculty and students to her house on Tuesday nights for a “conspiracy session.”  The whole idea is that one person presents an idea she’s been cooking up — and others react with hard questions and helpful comments.  The only requirement of coming is the promise that one day, you too will offer an idea that will change the world.

Tonight, it was my turn.

I can’t promise that I have anything more than a small idea that might marginally impact my own life … but I took the opportunity to reflect on this newness experiment I launched about a month ago, both to catalogue what I had experienced in the past 30 days and to consider what it all means.

Here are my reflections.
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About a month ago, I decided to do something new each day for 30 days.

This is partially because I really enjoy having new experiences — and partially because I wanted to spend my time in more purposeful ways.  I thought a simple daily task would be a good way to insert some purpose into my habits.

I decided to interpret the term “new” loosely — it could be things I’d never done or things I’d done once a long time ago … some new things I planned for; others just happened.

I made a list of things I wanted to do.  I wrote a blog post about how I was going to do this — and started a public Google doc to collect suggestions.

And then I just launched myself into the experiment.

• Day 1: Accupuncture
• Day 2: Fancy coffee-making
• Day 3: Visited the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and left with some free art
• Day 4: Visited the Dudley neighborhood in Boston; made a reservation on Air BnB for the first time
• Day 5: New music (Baloji); new shoes; walked through a new neighborhood
• Day 6: Tried heated “core power yoga;” watched a taxi driver in the US accept my mobile payment
• Day 7: Formally referred to as “Faculty” — without a PhD
• Day 8: Offered an exorbitant tip to somebody who didn’t notice — as it should be
• Day 9: Visited the US Institute of Peace; learned about Jeanette Rankin, the 1st woman to be elected to Congress (before women could vote)
• Day 10: Made buttermilk roast chicken
• Day 11: Remained silent on my new experiences
• Day 12: Enjoyed live music from Meklit Hedero
• Day 13: Watched the Super Bowl with some MBA students
• Day 14: Re-imagined the calendar
• Day 15: Had a new idea … i.e. wondered whether one could use a system dynamics framework to understand how to get money out of politics
• Day 16: Auditioned for the MIT Concert Choir … and got in
• Day 17: Tried a new Venezuelan restaurant
• Day 18: Listened to Morning Becomes Eclectic instead of WBUR’s Morning Edition
• Day 19: Enjoyed an avant-guarde dance performance at the ICA
• Day 20: Examined Boston’s urban environment, typeface, transport system, language, and the provenance of its snow salt through an exhibit at the Boston Society of Architects
• Day 21: Learned some new music in choir; watched undergraduate engineers rescue the conductor’s lost conducting stick using chemistry and physics
• Day 22: Made Valentine’s Day cards; gave them away to friends and strangers alike
• Day 23: Planned an art-culture-design-food weekend trip to Paris
• Day 24: Failed to do anything new
• Day 25: Launched myself on Parisian adventures; spent an afternoon looking at art throughout the city
• Day 26: Travels through the Haute Marais neighborhood
• Day 27: Consumed dessert, as a full meal, before dinner
• Day 28: Found myself in Seat 1A on a plane.
• Day 29: Today’s talk at the conspiracy!

Tomorrow is my last day and I know exactly how I want to end the month (stay tuned!).

So, what did I learn from this experience?

1. Balancing novelty and purpose.
Sometimes, it was important to stretch my boundaries; sometimes it was just important to notice what I was doing. I didn’t take a particularly precious approach to this task — on the one hand, there was value in occasionally going outside my comfort zone; on the other hand, it was equally beneficial to make small, but purposeful, adjustments to my use of time.

2. Engaging in ritual.
I have never been a religious person, but I wondered if this experience approximates that one, to a certain degree.  Doing something new every day made me at once joyful and duty-bound.  And it forced me to mark my time and make decisions by a greater standard (newness!).

3. On solving problems.
I notice that I did not do anything explicitly service-oriented, although I had some ideas.  One of tonight’s conspirators asked me, “So, what problem does this solve?”  I think it addresses an interesting issue (more on that to come), but I surely did not give a hungry person food to eat.   Perhaps a topic for greater reflection, but I wonder how my choices ended up to be so self-oriented….

4. We all have our own sense of “novelty.”
It was fascinating to read what people wrote in the public Google doc about how they would spend their time in new ways.  We all have such different aspirations!  Some of the more interesting ones included:

• Have a long conversation about faith with somebody of a different religious upbringing
• Go for a swim in the Charles River (Boston, MA)
• No electronics for 24 hours
• Build, make or repair something new and seemingly difficult: an appliance, technology, a table…
• Do nothing
• Write and mail a hand written letter to a friend or relative who lives far away
• Read an entire printed issue of the NYT cover to cover
• Go bungee jumping

So, what does this all mean?

As with any good life experience, there was a New York Times article written about the subject recently.  

Apparently, I am a “neophiliac.”  In other words, I am “novelty-seeking.”

Until recently, all the research said this was a bad thing.  I would be come addicted to drugs, I would probably start compulsively gambling, probably start showing signs of ADHD.

Novelty is apparently associated with a “migration gene” that affects the brain’s regulation of dopamine (the chemical that allows one to process rewards and new stimuli).  It is also, obviously, affected by one’s upbringing, local culture, and stage of life.  Novelty can lead, at the extreme, to restlessness and distraction.

However, a week ago, the NY Times announced that neophilia was now a good thing!

But, only in combination with two other key characteristics: