There is a Buddha in all of us. Kindness galore, when we try to impart knowledge to others. “Hey, don’t you worry, awright?! This is so simple you’ll love doing it.”
Perfect! This really works big time. Psychology! It’s the best way to motivate someone to learn without much fuss.
But, it works just the other way round for me. I get stumped when I get to hear such so called motivational words. I find myself reacting, “Easy, did you say? Really? But, I don’t find it so.”
Even before I could finish uttering these words, I find a sense of inferiority complex sneaking its way into me like a virus and corrupting the entire intellectual ecosystem – whatever little I have of it.
“Whatever is easy for you need not be easy for me, for heaven’s sake”, I feel like saying. But, having been endowed with a weak intellect, I can’t dare to express myself and so I keep me to myself.
But, this is where I find the savior coming in, in the form of MSTP. I feel excited and almost jump in happiness, when I read, “Avoid overusing subjective terms such as easy, fast, fun, and so on. If we say something is easy and the user finds it hard, we’ve risked alienating them. Being told over and over how easy and fun something is, can lead to distrust. Instead, demonstrate that something is easy or fun.”
To me, this is nectar, for I identify with these words so much.
Not just that… being an instructional designer, I can’t wait to apply this philosophy in my writing with 100% conviction.
Written by Nirmal Ranganathan
_________________________________
Published on 08-Jul-2013
