(2022-01-15) Brander Creativity Can Be Provoked On-Demand

Gordon Brander: Creativity can be provoked on-demand. Last week I looked at a procedural method for generating ideas. This week I want to share one of my favorite tools for thought, Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt’s Oblique Strategies. It’s one of my key inspirations for Subconscious.

So, creativity can be provoked at any time. Put another way, creativity can be procedurally generated.

You can draw a card to provoke meaning-construction at any time.

What if we look at Tarot through this lens?

Tarot cards have an archetypal flavor. Each card contains many symbols, provoking complex associations

Each card also has traditional meanings: one for when you draw the card upright, and another for when you draw it upside-down

What happens when we arrange cards into a structure? Perhaps we could place 3 cards in a row, for past, present, future. A story. Or perhaps these placements are for mind, body, spirit. A different story.

Ponder any two things long enough, and your mind will find a connection between them.

Like Oblique Strategies, it is up to you how to interpret the cards within a context to construct meaning.

Another way to see this: to use Oblique Strategies is to have a conversation between yourself and the cards.

Giving the cards a chance to “speak back” can help us leave behind certainty, equilibrium, stasis, and get lost in the land of ideas.

Provoking creative breakthroughs may not take much. Bad communication may admit good conversation. A simple deck of cards plus randomness may even do the trick.

This is also my intent with Geists: (Subconscious app)

Many tiny little spirits running around, provoking conversations between the self and the subconscious.