The Behavioral Change Essay An Embodied Writing Assignment

Abstract

This Behavioral Change Essay assignment is a trans-disciplinary reimagining of the personal narrative essay. Students are invited to embark on a four-week behavioral change of their choice (e.g. going to bed by 12 a.m., eating one vegan meal a day, playing guitar for thirty minutes each day, etc.) and are asked to observe what happens in the process by noticing what supports their new habit, or prevents them from establishing it. These observations, kept in a daily Observation Log, motivate their curiosity to research sources and fields of study that contextualize the social, cultural, technological and capitalistic mores students find themselves living within that may or may not support the values they hold. Through the practices of embodied writing and contemplative self-reflection, students learn how to identify tensions between themselves and the neoliberal demands they encounter in an engaged, exploratory 4- to 5-page self-reflective essay.