On being stuck

“I tell him getting stuck is the commonest trouble of all. … What you have to do is separate out the things and do them one at a time.”
— Robert Pirsig “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values“

Recently, I was tasked with writing a text for our Engineering Faculty’s holiday greeting card. It was one of those things that is not so difficult by itself, but that bothers you by lingering on the to-do list. I ended up with this assignment because someone asked if they could use a photo of mine (the one at the beginning of this post) for the card. Surely, I did not object; it was even flattering. When it became apparent that I was expected to write the text too, the kind that could be used for advertisement of our program to prospective students, I was less happy.

Incidentally, I was just reading an excellent analysis of the phenomenon of being stuck (in anything, but specifically in writing) in Robert Pirsig’s brilliant “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”. His basic concept is that “…getting stuck is the commonest trouble of all.” The reason is that we are multitasking without realizing it. Specifically, in the case of procrastinating at the beginning of a writing project, we are “…trying to think of what to say and what to say first at the same time and that’s too hard.”

So I decided to make an exercise out of my card-writing task. I systematically listed all the things that could be said about the surf at Botanical Beach and how that relates to engineering (fluid mechanics, West Coast, renewable energy, etc.) Then, given the space limit of about two short paragraphs, I narrowed it down to the things that would be most relevant, and suddenly, it was all done.

Here is the text:

“Waves that form at the ocean surface carry with them large amount of energy and can significantly impact coastal areas, offshore structures and vessels. Study of liquids and gases in motion, including ocean waves, is the subject of fluid dynamics. This area of engineering and science has tremendous potential for discovery and innovation because the underlying physical phenomena are complex and not completely understood.

Researchers at the University of Victoria have been studying ocean waves from a wide range of perspectives – from fundamental research of turbulent flows to design of devices for extracting energy from the waves to assessing the role that renewable energy, including that of ocean waves and currents, would play in sustainable energy systems in the future. This research relies on a large arsenal of state-of-the-art tools and techniques, including numerical modeling of waves and their interactions with energy devices using high-performance computers, visualization and analysis of turbulent flows in laboratory experiments using lasers and high-speed cameras and theoretical modeling of energy systems of entire regions and countries. ”