Professional Identity & Vision

One of my defining characteristics has always been that I like to explore as wide as possible. I have many different interests, and I am interested to see how these all fit together, rather than focussing on a single subject. You can see this in the way I have chosen my projects as well. On the one hand this is a strength, since it helps me understand many different subjects, and give me novel idea's on how these area's might interplay. on the other hand it is also a limiting factor in how deeply you can understand any one subject.

I like to challenge myself to grapple with new subjects, rather than staying in the comfort of what I already know. This tendency comes from an internal drive to really find out who I am and what I prefer. Over the past semester however, I have come to realise that it is not neccesary for me to keep challenging myself this way, especially if i don't really have any interest in that specific subject. For this reason I also only want to do one master, and I am currently planning on doing the dynamics and control master of mechanical engineering. I find that this fits closes with my interest in programming and automation, while still keeping the fysical characteristics of the device that you are working on in mind.

Identity

Over the past semester I have really begun a search to what it is that motivates me. I struggled a lot with finding the meaning of the things I do. I have come to realise that there is only one thing that truly matters to me. To me, life is about experience. Yet at the same time I have this interest in automating things, taking away some possible experiences. This seems contradicting, so let me elaborate. We humans are able to experience, and at the same time are able to be concious of the fact that we are experiencing. This gives us the unique ability to reflect about experiences, and the changing them. My focus of the design I make, is to create new experiences. Not only that, the fact that I cán do or make things, is the only reason needed to do those things. For if you could not do those things, you would not.

I also find it very difficult, almost scary, to write something about myself that specifies what my Identity is, since it could really change at a moment's notice. Whenever I find out about another thing that matters to me. This fluidity is a very integral aspect of who I am. This ability to change experiences that I mentioned before, includes being able to change yourself. In modern society there is also increasing room for this. Being able to spend the time and effort to figure out where you want

Vision

Designers have always been part of the avant garde challenging what is, and how we think. In a world where we are constantly bombarded by advertisements, this is more important than ever. We are given the idea choice, while in reality our thoughts are more externally shaped than ever. Designers should be the ones that concider this relation with our environment, and challenge others to think about this as well.

It is probably no surprise then that the course I enjoyed most was design for debate. In this course we were challenge to rethink everyday life and our relation with the things that surround us. How do we interact with these things, but more importantly, how do those things interact with us and other things around it.

This has also been a large contributing factor toward my newfound concern for the environment we live in. It is important to realise that the things we use do not only impact us. The designers role herein is twofold. On the one had we have the designers ability to make something that takes more that just humans into account. For example, when we make soemthing, does it polute the environment? Can we recycle it? And does it fit the environment that it is placed in? This is under the designers direct influence, and it has been a major determining factor in how the proces of my final bacheler project has gone. The other role of the designer is to make the user aware, make them really think and reconsider what they are doing when they are doing simple things.