An exercise of will, part 2

[darkemeralds]

Today I'm knitting. Knitting is part of my Big Plan For Self-Improvement In 2012.

It's taken years, but I've finally accepted that "self-improvement" doesn't mean changing what I am. It means being better at what I am.

Well, what I am, among other things, is a craftswoman, and I like knitting. So I've decided that 2012 is the year I become as good a knitter in reality as I am in my imagination



I've defined four knitting skills* I want to master, and four big projects** that those skills will help me achieve this year.



My first proving ground is an Aran-style cardigan, which I started in November. Last night I finished the second sleeve, and this morning I looked at those sleeves in the proverbial cold light of day.

It wasn't a happy moment.

I told myself some stories about how I could make them work. Tight forearms could be a style statement...yeah! Nobody will notice the weird leg-o'mutton line of the shoulder...right?

I argued with myself for fifteen minutes before I finally admitted that the sleeves were simply wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. A month's worth of knitting, wasted.



In The Practicing Mind, Thomas Sterner proposes a simple model for any practice, drawn from Buddhist tradition: Do, Observe, Correct.

Well, I'd Done, and, like most hurried Westerners, I was about to Re-Do. I always just Re-Do. It is the slowest, most inefficient way to improve at anything, but it's the way our entire society seems to favor. "Again! Repeat! Go-go-go!" We hurry to do it wrong one more time. Only the naturally gifted move ahead, while we sacrifice loads of potential talent on the altar of haste.

Just as I was about to start ripping those sleeves out, something went *ping*. It said, "Slow down. You're about to make the same mistakes again."

So before I raveled a single stitch, I Observed. I checked my math and found my error. I measured everything again. I acknowledged a second problem with the sleeves that I'd been ignoring. I photographed, annotated, and Evernoted. I updated my written pattern.

Then I ripped the sleeves back to the shoulders and started them all over again.

This time, all the uncertainty and wild-ass guesswork of the careless first Doing are gone. This is Correction, and I know it, and so the work is calmer, more confident, more regular. Faster, even. It's better.

I think I'm beginning to understand these magical people who consistently produce high-quality work without angst. I think I might be able to become one of them.

It's about time.

*matching increases and decreases, Kitchener grafting and bind-off, short-row shaping, top-down raglan shoulders

**Two cardigans, a jacket, and possibly a pullover.

Comments

[jumpuphigh]

Would you like me to dig up the two Kitchener videos I use when I need to use that stitch for you? (Yes, I need both of them. They are each clear on separate parts of the process.)

[flaneurgardening.com]

Nothing more frustrating than realising an error that far in, but on the other hand it's very fulfilling when you then realise just how to correct it so you end up with something that will actually be worn!

That said, it looks like a great pattern! I'm currently doing an improvised raglan jumper in a much simpler design, and there's something quite fulfilling about producing something that you actually look forward to wearing.

(Oh, and this is Sorenr from LJ...)

[vampirefan]

when i first learned to knit, i remember that the teacher would have us all do stitch pattern swatches. i had a spiral notebook full of swatches. all tied to the spiral with the pattern written on the page next to it.

that really helped me, i think, to pay attention and learn really well what the knit and purl stitches look like (i know a new-ish knitter who still has trouble with that), how cables form and how different stitches affect the finished product. i can't find my damn notebook. i think it got left in mexico when i moved here and was lost at some point (even though i left it in the house my parents still owned at the time)

when i picked up knitting again, i came across a book: "magnificent mittens" and that one had a bunch of different castons and castoffs that i'd never seen and i tried 'em all out (still haven't made any mittens from that book!)

so basically. yes, practice makes perfect! :P

From Happytune

[(Anonymous)]

Good approach - I'm going to remember that. Do. Observe. Correct.

Funny when I saw your pre-Observation photo I did what /I/ always do. Not 'Re-Do', but 'Adapt'. I thought, 'well you could cut it here and sew it to some wonderful fabric sleeve and then you'd have a funky sleeve to add to something else'. Which is why I have half a million half-finished projects in my drawer. So I'm going to try the way you've outlined here, and Observe and Correct those before I start a new project! Thank you!

[scribblemoose]

What an interesting thought. It's a subtle difference in the idea of what constitutes 'practise' isn't it? The addition of mindfulness to the process converts it from random to planned learning.

Good luck with the knitting! I'm just about to start on my first knitting project in about fifteen years, very exciting!

[tehomet]

I can but don't knit, but this was still a very interesting post.

[executrix]

As for those people who "consistently produce high-quality work without angst"--I suspect that the 15-second version of how they produced the admirable result (be it beautiful shawl or exciting novel) leaves out the interim reports that probably involved a number of false starts or even saying "Screw it, it won't fit the baby but it will fit the dog."

[panisdead]

This post inspired me to make a test swatch for my next project. (I NEVER make a test swatch). And I'm really glad I did this time, because I had to go up two needle sizes. Yikes.