Rowan Spazzoli

Strategist. Lecturer. Consultant

An odd type of serendipity

Throughout my friend’s visit to Cape Town this past week we referred to Adele’s “Someone Like You”, as it was part of an awkward scene in a series we follow. We kept singing it a cappella while driving and at one stage we went through CDs in my car on the off chance we’d find it, but to no avail.

We were heading to the airport this evening and having a great chat. As we were approaching the drop off area I spontaneously changed the radio station.

And there it was.

The opening chords to the epic Adele ballad.

Naturally, we lost our minds.

We sung it at the top of our lungs and voice noted our friend group. Even after we parked we continued to belt it out, to the horror of the security guards.

It was an odd bit of serendipity. A chance occurrence that was magnified by the fact that we hadn’t heard the song all week, despite consistently bringing it up.

In reality, it was probably some form of confirmation bias or Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, where we ignore all the other possible times this could have occurred in favour of a single confirmatory data point. It may even have its own specific term to describe it.

However, despite my academic mind’s attempt to recognize this as nothing more than a psychological phenomenon, I still find it meaningful. It was a chance happening that capped off a joyous few days.

It was our own odd little moment of serendipity.

Image was taken on our visit to Kalk Bay on Sunday afternoon

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A Culture of Resolute Friendship

I left high school just over six and a half years ago. Over that time I have had many amazing friends, but my friendship with my school friends still stands out as one of the most important. The group of five of us are incredibly close, and we are still a very central component to one another’s lives.

I discussed this last night with one of the team members over a whiskey and cigar on a balcony. We realized that our group has developed an unwavering culture of friendship, where we will make any sacrifice to see one another, no matter how small the window of time is. For example, I was in Joburg for one day last month and we managed to squeeze in a 7am breakfast just to see one another.

We also try to arrange a big trip for our group at least once a year. This year we rented a house in Wilderness for a week, next year we’re planning 10 days in Dullstroom and in 2019 we’re aiming to go to the Rugby World Cup in Japan.

Our whatsapp group has been going since 2012, and is active almost every single day. We discuss everything from our work lives to sport, and will regularly use to vent or tell stories.

This resolve and commitment to our friendship has created a self sustaining culture that will transcend any changes in our individual lives. We’ll make time for each other whether we have families, change jobs or are on the other side of the world to one another.

Almost seven years out of school and we have grown and shaped our friendship into the most beautiful shared experience. With these four people, I can unashamedly be myself and know that they will always be there if I need them.

I cannot wait for all the spectacular years of friendship to come

Image is from Beau Constantia’s wine tasting room. Earlier this year, one of the friends was down from Joburg for work and suddenly some time free. Naturally, I stopped what I was doing and we met up and had a wonderful afternoon together

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Wall Running

I saw a video on YouTube a few months ago about trampoline wall tricks. My immediate reaction was “omg I really want to learn how to do that.”

Three weeks ago I joined a dodgeball team at Rush, a trampoline park. During one of the breaks I decided to try to wall run. I wasn’t even able to fall onto my back and bounce back up.

I spent the entire session trying to do this, and could hardly manage it without getting a whiplash. By the end of the session, I could just manage to bounce off my back and onto my feet.

Two weeks ago I started trying to maintain a rhythm while tapping my feet on the wall. I could manage a couple in a row at most

Last week I got to a point where I could maintain a perpetual bounce by pushing off the wall. It felt epic.

This week, I spent the entire time trying to bounce off my back, wall run and stand up on the ledge, which is about 3m high. After an excessive number of tries and an onset light headedness, I managed it.

What I love about this is the clear, measurable and visible learning process. From not being able to bounce on my back to being able to wall run it was less than four total hours in just under a month. The key to getting there was a conscious commitment and the will to push it a bit further every time.

I’m not quite at the level seen in that video. But I know I can get there if I put my mind to it 🙂

Image is of the BYD Dodgeball team. It’s the first time the team has entered the league, and we’re not doing too badly 🙂

 

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Going Beyond

When dealing with students in the courses I manage my mantra is to consistently go beyond the call of duty in helping them. In my email exchanges I often include an offer of support if they need it. I’ll sometimes come to campus just to meet with one student to chat about their exam worries. And I’ll give out my number in the course documentation in case there is an emergency.

It can sometimes be very tiring and overwhelming . Particularly in a week like this where we’re dealing with protests, final DP/ marks lists and are a week away from exams (which are taking place in a militarized tent). In the last 2 days alone I have had almost 100 emails that have been tended to.

However, despite this it is worth it. It creates an environment where students aren’t afraid to ask for help. It gives them the opportunity to stumble without the fear of wiping out. And most importantly for me, it sometimes helps foster a deep and long lasting connection that goes beyond the course.

And this is where the magic lies for me. For the majority of students, they’ll never engage this much or need the support. But for the one or two that do, I can have a real impact. And that is ultimately why I teach- so that I can be involved in helping a person grow in their academic, personal and professional life, and that I can grow alongside them.

So yes, it can be exhausting some times. But going beyond is what makes it worth it, and I wouldn’t change a thing

Image is with Langa Manqele (Centre), one of our guest lecturers on the course and Vuyo (right) one of the students.

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Make Hay While the Sun Shines

On my white board at home I’ve begun writing up a list of potential blog ideas that I didn’t use on the day I thought of them, cause I had something else to write. One day, when I get writers block or begin to run out of ideas for #365of25, I’ll turn to this list for inspiration.

Such fluctuations in life are inevitable and often out of our control. We experience intense highs and deep lows, in almost all spheres. One of the ways in which we can handle this is taking some of the up and helping it smooth out the down.

This may sound cliche but it’s a genuinely good strategy for managing turbulence. Some of the ways I do it include:

  • Going over an above the required work on the courses I manage so that when I’m not managing other people can step in.
  • Preparing food for myself when I have the energy to so that there’s something for when I’m tired.
  • Saving as much money as I can when it’s available so that I can draw on it when I need it.
  • Setting up systems to manage any mental health problems when I’m in a good head space to help when I’m in a bad one
  • Then blogging example mentioned above

It’s not a particularly revolutionary system. It’s essentially an inter-temporal shift of available resources. But it’s a simple and effective tool for managing life’s inevitable ups and downs.

Image is from a recent holiday with school friends. It was taken somewhere on the road between George and Cape Town

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Our Slow Interbrain Network Speed

Computers linked to the internet can share an incredible about of information in an unbelievable speed. An article can be downloaded instantly, an entire book in a few seconds.

Our brains, however, have a little more difficulty sharing information. If I want a person to know what I’m thinking, I have to either speak to them or text them. However, at most I can speak only around 150 words a minute and on my phone I can probably type about 40-50 words a minute at most (plus that person then needs to read the text).

This means we have to use shortcuts. In terms of being on the receiving end of the information, you have to pick up on other bits of information from a person (such as facial expression) or make assumptions about what a person is trying to say.

On the side of the person sharing the information, you have to summarize your thinking as succinctly as possible while still sharing the important parts. Even then you might only get a fraction of what you want across.

As a result of this limitation on the rate of information transfer, it is essential that we learn to communicate effectively. This includes both how we share our information as well as what we are sharing. It is impossible for another person to truly understand what is going on on your head.

One day in the future this might change. Projects like Elon Musk’s Neuralink are aiming to make the rate of information transfer between human brains much more rapid.

Until then, we’re just gonna have to learn to speak our mind.

Image is from the RMB boardroom where I invigilated an exam earlier this year. This is another example of how slow our information transfer is. It takes 4 hours for a student to try and relay how much they know about our subject, and an hour for a marker to verify this.

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Mental Health Movement

Mental health has been receiving much more recognition and main stream attention over the last few years. I’ve noticed the general increase in the number of articles and social media posts about the issue.

More importantly though is the change in how we talk about it. Today I had 3 different conversations and a voice note on WhatsApp where mental health was discussed. In one conversation we spoke about how our psychologists/therapists have helped us unpack and deal with problems. The voice note was an honest and open message about how my friend had seen a psychiatrist and what their experience was of that.

This is an incredibly exciting trend because, despite it being about a complex and difficult issue, it shows that we’re making steps towards managing it properly. As a friend of mine said “one day we’ll look at maintaining mental health in the same way we currently view exercising or gyming as maintaining physical health”.

We’re finally starting to look after our mental states, and that’s awesome.

Image is from our end of year staff party at the Grand this afternoon 🙂

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365 Lessons

On my birthday I decided to start my #365of25 challenge, where I write a blog post every day for a year. I didn’t really know what I’d put in these posts, just that I needed to write them.

I’ve noticed that, despite it only being 4 days in, my mode of thinking has begun to change. Throughout the course of the day I am constantly looking for something to learn and something to write about.

As a result, I’m consistently consolidating my learning and trying to draw lessons from the day.

This means that at the end of this journey I will have 365 new lessons written for myself (and others) to read and reflect on.

4 down, 361 to go

Image is from our meeting at Nkomshish Laundry today. We’ve got an exciting venture planned in partnership with Mzee (pictured centre)

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