Teaching Kindness

 Teaching Kindness – Improv, a Venue for Values 

 

On a cool December night, the line outside of the Noh Stage Theater was long waiting to get in to see Awkward Dinner Party, an unusual long form improvisation format with a three-person cast.  The lady standing behind me struck up a conversation.  She wanted to sing the praises of Lisa Rowland, one of the principals of the improv show-- “She is really brilliant as a teacher and more importantly I admire her as a person.  I mean, she is just so good, so kind and so positive.  Lisa is an amazing teacher, and an awesome human being.”  I nodded agreement, mentioning that she had been one of my students at Stanford. We were both fans.

 

Lisa comes from the crucible of the Stanford Improvisers, a group I founded in 1991.  They have the reputation of being “the nicest group to play with.”  I was always pleased and flattered by that appellation.  More important than being funny, is being kind, nice, easy and thoughtful to play with.  Yup, the SIMPS were the nicest group at any tournament. 

 

At the heart of our work as improv teachers is the possibility to change the world.  We do this both by modeling the behaviors we want to teach as well as finding ways both indirect and direct to teach them.  Whether we acknowledge it or not all teaching is value laden, so why not teach the virtues our society needs?  Everyone wants to have more positive social and interpersonal interactions, but they don’t know how.  Many of us are stuck in old patterns of reacting.  Improv provides a canvas upon which we can teach people how to listen better and be kinder to each other. 

 

I teach a workshop called: “Working with difficult people.”  Everyone shows up for this.  And, then there’s a bit of bait and switch.  Once in the room I tell everyone that the only difficult person they can change is themselves.

 

It’s easy to see that selfishness and self-interest is at the root of many of our social problems.  Everyone wants a more satisfying life.  How does kindness fit into this? Improv can be both a metaphor and a tool to discover a kinder version of youself.  

 

As a tool the games can be used to lift others up or cut each other down.  If you study comedy, you’ll soon discover that the quickest way to get a laugh is to put someone else down.  “Hay, there, fellow, that’s a nice dog you’ve got there.  That’s no dog, that’s my wife.” 🤣🤣🤣 (a double put down.)

 

I once taught an offsite workshop to a group of middle managers at a famous tech company in Silicon Valley.  Team building was the subject of our work together. The leader had warned me that they were unable to agree on anything.  And, it seems that improv was the only workshop that they did not reject.  They thought it would be fun at least.

 

On the Saturday morning of our off-site workshop we all showed up at the fancy hotel conference room, replete with the obligatory deluxe breakfast buffet.  After the mingling about and swilling down coffee and smoked salmon on bagels we got the workshop going.  “If you’d please join me now in a circle we can “let the games” begin.  I often start with a simple game called “Sound Ball” where we pretend to throw a sound (miming the action of throwing a ball).  The person that it is thrown to mimes catching the ball and repeats the sound that was thrown.  Then the receiver throws a new sound to someone else, etc. and the throwing and catching continues.  It’s a very simple game but brings up lots of issues typically.  As we played, I side-coached.  I’d suggest: “Become a good catcher.”  Pay more attention to receiving than to sending something creative.  It’s common for folks to think ahead to come up with an interesting sound when it came their turn.  This act of “choosing a good sound” commonly interferes with the attention needed to catch or field the balls.  So, from time to time in the game I’d cheerfully make suggestions about shifting one’s attention from self to the others in the circle.  

 

Half an hour in, at a break, the man who had hired me to lead the workshop took me aside to give me some instructions: (I’ll never forget his words.)  “Nix on all that good advice, lets get on with the fun and games.”   He simply wanted to do improv games so that they could make jokes and one-up each other.  They were actually skillful at putting each other down.  Cooperation seemed like some distant dream.  (Think our current political divide.)  Since he was the boss I pulled back on the “good advice” part of my teaching.  Sad really.  Improv could help a situation like this.  In my introduction class I remind us that sarcasm, which is a common form of “clever exchange” is a kind of poison in an improv world. Its function is a put down. It can create comedy, but rarely good-will.  I once saw a bumper sticker that read: :  “Tact is for people not witty enough to be sarcastic.  Sarcasm is for people not intelligent enough to be tactful.” If we encourage or foster sarcasm, we are in danger of giving them strategies for cruelty.

 

An improv class is a place to build trust and safety. We learn to eschew the easy laugh that comes from blocking an offer

 

Over time improv can turn a group of normal, selfish bozos into a team of agreeable, cooperative, resourceful bozos.  Self interest is normal.  With improv games we can make interest in one’s fellows into something that is attractive, productive and doable.

 

What  are some strategies for teaching kindness? 

 

1.     Status games that focus on raising the status of the other person

2.     Games that focus on “thank you” and “I’m sorry” (Do as a circle)

a.  “Thanks to whom are we here today” 

3.     Random Acts of Kindness Stories

4.     Any game can be debriefed with instructions that focus on ‘taking care of the other person.”

5.     Teambuilding games ( the A B C game—sharing control)

6.     Ball Games can be debriefed to suggest that we “focus on being a good receiver, smile to make others feel good and never correct.”

 

Have a discussion about how self interest is normal, and how shifting the attention to your partner produces good will and cooperation.

 

Kindness can also be manifest in the kinds of characters that we play in scenes.  Suggest that characters can have high moral standards.  Good stories often have villains or “bad guys.”  But don’t confuse this with just being stubborn or argumentative.  Keep your humanity.  Chose to play heroes. We all love heroes.  The best heroes aren’t the superhero brand, but ordinary folks.