Difusión del SAT

This section shows how the use of artefacts influenced the course of felt-sensing, and in some cases, the articulation of stories and thus the process of meaning-making. Some predominant themes emerged from the analysis of the narratives obtained from the application of the Love

exercise. In these, the stimuli generated by the devices had different effects in people’s bodily

self-awareness.

7.4.1 Device stimuli can bridge the tacit with the tangible dimensions

This theme refers to how the use of tangible stimuli and Focusing works as a handle to explore the tacit dimension, giving memories an enhanced bodily character. As a result, apart from its intellectual quality, the process of meaning-generation is perceived as a somatic experience. The use of wearable stimuli assisted in the generation of two main effects: 1) amplification of sensations, leading to the acknowledgement and confirmation of the source of happiness, and 2) the sensation of “being there”, transported to the situation or memory. This act of being transported was not only intellectual or creative, but also somatic. As a result of filtering out ideas

through the body, some participants experienced sensing their memories on specific body parts.

For instance, participant OM1 pointed out: “Through reminding the happy moment with my [significant

object], I realised that the memory comes from the body part it had contact with. I could remember something from the body part straight away.”

interaction with objects appeared in several of our narratives. It is important to note how aesthetic experiences are ongoing building relations between artefacts and people (Wright & McCarthy, 2004). Even in more evaluative narratives such as in table 2, the participant describes how vibration was feeling normal, until imagining his happy situation made the sensation spread on his chest. Some of the adjectives collected in this process of immersing and recalling are: spreading, expanded, amplifying, transported, thought enhancing, grounded. Participant OM2 who reflected on playing cricket with his friends pointed out: “Heat helps generate feeling that you are

"breathing into" the materiality of the body. E.g. The muscles, which tell a certain story about body, habits and past events”. By applying the stimulus in combination with Focusing, somatic qualities can be

directly accessed through the exploration of the tacit.

7.4.2 Devices can function as tools for mapping the body geography of felt-sensing manifestations

As previously discussed, the felt sense is an inner state that not only contains feelings and memories, but also a strong bodily component (Gendlin, 1996). When sustained self- awareness is purposely practiced, we can start noticing that these somatic sensations change and move around the body. Our devices were useful to map the body’s terrain, helping participants to keep track of these series of inner movements as expressed in Table 43.

Table 43 - Some examples of devices mapping the body

WM3: “The experience was perhaps more profoundly felt with the hot water bag. It was possible to more

accurately notice parts of the experience. The hot water was also a way to follow awareness/ sensations as it felt and moved through the body”

OF1: “The device served as a ‘detector’. It helped me detect a part of my body that reacted the most to the

experience. It enhanced the sensations and brought meaningful links to what the concert signified for me” (Vibration)

Figure 33 - Body map from participant WF9. Keywords: Comfort, safe, discovery, excitement Table 44 - Observations of body language and possible meaning

How the body is mapped Body language keywords Possible interpretation

Participant places device on a specific part of the upper torso and stays there.

Calm. Smiley face.

Head facing up, like imagining. The device is carefully being held.

Felt-sensing what is loved.

Participant places the device on different parts around the torso, taking some few seconds on each pause.

Slightly frowning, as expressing concentration.

Careful movements.

Searching or following the felt sense, as it moves and changes.

Participant places the device on different parts around the torso before staying on one spot.

Slightly frowning, as expressing concentration at first. Then the facial expression changes to calm.

After searching and tracking sensations, the participant finds the felt sense.

Participant places the device on different body parts, taking some few seconds on each pause. Sometimes devices are placed up and down, following a linear trajectory.

Calm, Neutral Rapid movements.

Instead of felt-sensing, the participant is focused on the perceptual qualities given by the prop.

Participant places the device on areas where the felt sense is not generally perceived.

Calm, neutral. The participant might be trying to

match a specific physical memory with the stimulus (i.e. recalling riding a bike and the effort on legs leads the participant to place device on calves)

Different ways of mapping the felt-sense were observed, expressed through various forms of body language (Table 44). Beside the narratives, through the observation of participant’s body language it is possible to determine whether a participant is felt sensing, exploring the relationship between body and thought or in the process of generating meaning. Body maps are also useful to complement these observations, as observed in Figure 33 - Body map from participant WF9. Keywords: Comfort, safe, discovery, excitement, where the participant WF9 expressed to have perceived the feeling of happiness accentuated by using the heat prop on chest and abdomen. During the session, our participant was smiling, and holding the prop as described in the first row in Table 44. After the workshop finished, the participant still expressed her satisfaction in regard to the idea of using heat to access memories. Although portability of devices is important to facilitate inner dialogue, flow, and to follow the felt- sense’s movement the process of meaning generation experienced through the body, in part, transcends these design considerations.

In previous research (Núñez-Pacheco & Loke, 2014b), I have discussed the importance of trusting perceptible feedback to generate spaces for inner observation. When feedback is immediate and spaces for unreliability are less obvious (such as in the case of the stimulus generated by water bag), disagreements between the user’s expectation and the perceptible feedback still might occur. These disagreements do not prevent the body to find its way in the process of meaning-generation, as discussed in chapter 2 through the concept of reiterated implying and carrying forward. These philosophical concepts are exemplified in the category below.

7.4.3 Mirror or scaffolding: Devices provide open-ended clues for the body to complete with meaning

Höök et al.’s framework on Somaesthetic appreciation design (Höök et al., 2016) introduces one interesting point about designing feedback that makes sense to the rhythms of the body. Since these props have been used to surface and shape information from the tacit, non-explicit dimension of our reality, such manifestations remain partially unknown until acknowledged. In the practice of Focusing, the body finds its way to generate meaning, even beyond our immediate, conscious understanding. As Gendlin points out (1993), the body already knows its

situation, and by paying attention we get in contact with the interactional nature of our implicit

in Focusing facilitates two possible responses: a) the meaning is mirrored to the participant/focuser, confirming and reinforcing the inner state of felt-sensing, or b) the wording might not be the one that feels right, stimulating the search for a new, fresh term representing the inner meaning more accurately. In Focusing, this active searching is a process that occurs continuously, as experiencing is interactional, as discussed in chapter 2.

Similar to the act of reflective listening, the stimuli generated by the props contain sensory information, which can work either as a mirror that reflects back, or as scaffolding for new meaning- searching. For instance, in Table 45, vibration was useful to accentuate the participant’s felt- sense, acting as a mirror.

Table 45 - Male participant (WM01) - vibration as a mirror (excerpt)

My happy situation is the moment I came back from work, or finishing a big project, and got back to home, laying down on my bed. My body feels melting and I feel satisfied. When I used the vibration on my body, it emphasised this melting “feeling” […]. The pleasure comes from the satisfaction of “finishing something”, kind of a sense of accomplishment, other comes from finding all my stress goes away, no more deadlines, no more plans I need to worry about, I enjoy the “stress relieving” feeling. Is emphasised both physically and mentally.

In some cases, the stimuli generated by the prop did not feel right in the participants’ subjective process, however these dissonances had a transformative character in the interactional construction of the aesthetic experience. We can see this process exemplified in the following narrative, as in the example in Table 46, where heat acts as scaffolding to new meaning making.

Table 46 - Male participant W13 - Heat as scaffolding

“The thought that I had chosen was my last visit to Watson’s Bay – a beautiful beach. Now, I usually felt in these sessions the deeper meaning that I gathered was usually something familiar or close to the heart. Not this time. This time I felt the sensation of isolation and noise […] I started questioning my reason for being there. The device felt like a foreign object from a different world- alive but strange. Its texture informed me on a furry animal, but its fluidity suggested something otherworldly. The creature had to move, but I did not know if it was defending or tucking me away! I realised then that I was staring at my own mortality. For the calming and chaotic nature of the beach was my personal symbol of death and inevitability. It was a calming and chaotic duality I had been observing all this time.”

These narratives show how the complexity of human experience takes shape when open spaces of self-dialogue are facilitated. This process of self-dialogue can be insightful and pleasurable, as well as deep and sometimes confronting. Aesthetic aspects of interaction do not need to be solely focused on pleasure, as that would embody a reductionist understanding of the richness of our humanness (Petersen et al., 2004). Open stimuli can also act as a metaphor, shaped by the inner somatic process of the participant. In the light of these results, my initial interest of assessing artefacts under the sole dichotomy of distracting-enhancing to the practice of Focusing proved to be too simplistic.

7.5 Aesthetic qualities of heat and vibration in the context of the Focusing