Reading Response #8: Artful Design Chapter 8: “Manifesto” + Coda

Alanna Sun

November 14, 2021

CS 476A, Stanford University

Reading Response: Pause, For the Small Good Things.

This week’s reading discusses the core concepts that we’ve covered over the course of the past eight weeks, honing in on what all these design principles boil down to: reaching towards the sublime through designing an experience that becomes an end in itself rather than a means. The key principle that stood out to me most was 8.23: Pause. For the Small Good Things. This design principle felt especially relevant and really spoke to me given the past two years of the pandemic. Quarantining at home was all about making the small things good, and making the small things that were already good even better by attempting to understand exactly why I valued them and how I could focus on those aspects more. Pausing to reflect on the mundane and banal--the regular actions that we autopilot, and sometimes trudge, through--allowed me to reshape my experience with the everyday things in life, and became an opportunity to redesign my habits and interactions into activities that makes me wonder, feel, and be intentional about doing. This process of reflecting is what leads to the consideration and discovery of what makes something worthy of survival, which, as principle 8.12 states, is a stronger notion than survival itself. To get at the reason for why we want things to change or to stay still is to get closer to the notion of truth, or the sublime. We are always designing our own experience, but rarely do we get a chance to focus on the small good things and think about why it is that we wish for them to survive. For example, why do I enjoy taking a walk outside after it’s just rained? What is it about the experience that makes me wish for it to happen again in the same manner? The scent of the after-storm air and the newly stripped branches with leaves that have just been washed off, scattered around the well-trodden paths of the street, all come together to conjure a sense of stillness. Perhaps it’s the feeling of cleansing coupled with the calmness after a storm that has passed. For me, for whatever reason, walking around after the rain always brings back the memory of the excitement of going to elementary school on the morning of a scholastic book fair. But how do I capture this feeling of after-rain stillness in a more universal sense? How can I compel others to feel this as well, and know that we can connect through such a small thing? I guess that is why I’m interested in design--it’s figuring out why these small good things make us feel the way we do, and then trying to touch others through that sentiment. It reminds me of a quote from John Keats: “We hate poetry that has a palpable design upon us—and if we do not agree, seems to put its hand in its breeches pocket. Poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one’s soul, and does not startle it or amaze it with itself but with its subject.”