Lighting Reflection

In class we were asked to work on a paper quiz in pure candle light with a group to crack some estimation problems. This was extremely challenging for more reasons than the obvious ones. Besides it just being really difficult to see our work it also made it hard to concentrate, to communicate, and to stay engaged in what we were doing. Because we couldn't really see each other's faces we couldn't rely on any non verbal communication through body language or hand gestures so in order to be fully present I felt I had to especially tune-in which required much more energy than usual. Concentrating was hard because of the amount of effort (and headache) it took to try and read the paper. I was much more prone to zone off around the room instead of focusing on my work. When were allowed to use the lanterns it was much, much easier to complete the tasks at hand. The questions seemed less daunting and much clearer. Even with the lanterns, the lighting certainly wasn't ideal but much an improvement. It was very enlightening (no pun intended) to do this exercise. It really shows how inefficient it is to work with by candle light at night (not to mention the cost of candles over time!).