Creative Journey: The ECHO Way to Creative Work Study (Note)
This is a short note
The above picture is designed to close the Slow Cognition project (Phase II). I will use it for a new possible book too.
Yesterday I had a conversation about my recent creative work with Maurizio Goetz. In the past several months, I focused on the Slow Cognition project (phase II).
On April 26, 2021, I sent an email to a friend of mine and introduced my book The ECHO Way which reflects on my journey of writing three books in six months. I coined a new term called Slow Cognition to describe my favorite methods such as Howard E. Gruber’s evolving systems approach to creative work.
In Jan 2022, I designed the above picture and wrote a short post on Linkedin.
I used “A Theme for Creative Work Study in 2022” as the title of the short post. I spent 30 minutes designing a logo for Slow Cognition. This technique is called Objectification from the perspective of Project-oriented Activity Theory. Cognitive psychologists called it Cognitive Offloading. If an idea is very important to you, you could make a logo, design a picture, write a slogan, and print out these things.
It’s clear that I wanted to apply Howard E. Gruber’s evolving systems approach to conduct a research project.
On May 19, 2022, I closed the Slow Cognition Project (Phase I) with a possible book titled: Knowledge Discovery: Developing Tacit Knowlege with Thematic Space Canvas.
Today I want to close the Slow Cognition project (phase II) with a new picture.
The major outcome of Phase II are the following three things:
1. The “Project — Journey” Structure for Creative Work Study
I developed the concept of “Creative Journey” as a new unit of analysis for studying creative life.
2. A new method of Mapping Creative Life with a set of tools
I designed a series of maps and developed a new method for mapping a creative person’s various creative projects from different units of analysis.
3. The ECHO Way (v3.0) model for Creative Cognition
I also developed the ECHO Way (v3.0) model for understanding Creative Cognition. The v3.0 emphasizes the ecological approach to cognition and applies it to study Creative Thematic Dialogue.
I use my own creative life from 2019 to 2022 as data for this research.
Now it is time to edit a possible book and close Phase II.
I’d like to organize the new possible book into the following four parts:
Part 1. Knowledge Heroes
Part 1 focuses on several knowledge heroes who influenced my creative life, especially the Creative Work Study project.
- Howard Gruber
- Lev Vygotsky
- Donald Schön
- James J. Gibson
- Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
Part 1 also introduces theoretical resources behind the ECHO Way (v3.0) model.
Part 2. Creative Life
Part 2 introduces my approach to creativity research: the “Process as Product” approach. You can find more details in The NICE Way and Creative Actions.
I also developed a new structure of units of analysis:
- Creative Actions
- Creative Work (Projects)
- Creative Journey
- Creative Life
The “Process as Product” approach emphasizes the creative life experience of people. In 2021, it led to the Path of Creative life. See the diagram below.
I pointed out that there are three timescales for the “Process as Product” approach in the article about the Path of Creative Life.
- Moment: creative action
- Project: creative work
- Life: creative life
Now I want to add a new unit of analysis called “Creative Journey” to the “Process as Product” approach.
What’s a Creative Journey?
A Creative Journey is a long-term activity including several creative projects.
From the perspective of Cognitive Metaphor theory, the metaphor behind the journey is the Event-Structure metaphor. According to George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Journeys are long-term activities.
If we put the Source-Path-Goal schema and the Event-Structure metaphor together, we can use them to understand the two levels of “Journey”.
- Journey: the Event-Structure metaphor, long-term activities, and a number of intermediate purposes.
- Project: the Source-Path-Goal schema, short-term projects, each project refers to an intermediate purpose of the Journey.
In this way, we can expand the Path of Creative Life from three units of analysis to four units of analysis:
- Moment: creative action
- Project: creative work
- Journey: creative projects
- Life: creative life
For example, my journey of “Engaging with Activity Theory” is a Creative Journey. On Sept 15, 2022, I reflected on the journey and selected four creative projects for a case study. See the diagram below:
You can find more details in Slow Cognition: Mapping Thematic Journey (Engaging with Activity Theory, 2020–2022).
Part 3: Mapping Creative Life
Part 3 introduces the new method and a series of tools with some case studies.
- Mapping Thematic Landscape (Case Study: Curativity, 2019–2022)
- Mapping Thematic Journey (Case Study: Engaging with Activity Theory, 2020–2022)
- Mapping Thematic Dialogue (Case Study: The “Activity — Opportunity” Thematic Dialogue)
- Mapping Thematic Dialogue: ECHO (Case Study: “Thematic Engagement”)
- Theme U [Case Study: The Development of AAS (August 21, 2021 — August 26, 2022)]
- Wideness Canvas (Case Study: The Ecological Practice Approach in Feb 2020)
Part 4: The ECHO Way (v3.0)
I also developed the ECHO Way (v3.0) model for understanding Creative Cognition.
The v3.0 emphasizes the ecological approach to cognition and applies it to study Creative Thematic Dialogue.
There is a specific aspect of my creative journey:
I always worked on thematic dialogues and most my significant insights were born from thematic dialogues.
In the past several years, I worked on connecting THEORY and PRACTICE. Since I didn’t work on only one theory, there was a challenge for me. I had to maintain the boundary between one theory and the others. For example, Activity Theory and Ecological Psychology.
However, I found the zone of boundary is a great creative space for developing new ideas. Sometimes, I can find similarities between these two theories.
Eventually, I found a new way to develop a thematic dialogue between two different theories.
The above diagram represents the process of the journey of making the Thematic Engagement framework by running a thematic dialogue between Activity Theory and Ecological Psychology.
What’s my strategy behind the process?
- Move from “Theory” to “Thematic Space”
- Move from “User” to “Maker”
- Switch between Host and Guest
- Second-wave Development
- Close A Thematic Dialogue
You can find more details in Slow Cognition: The “Activity — Opportunity” Thematic Dialogue.
I also found there are six “ECHOes” within the journey of making the Thematic Engagement framework. “Themes of Practice” and “Project Engagement” are not the only two sources of the final outcome. See the diagram below.
You can find the large-size diagram and more details in Slow Cognition: The Echoes of A Thematic Dialogue.
I realized that there is a deep pattern behind these journeys. See the diagram below.
The basic unit of creative thematic dialogue is visualized with the “MEET — ECHO-MOVE” schema in the above diagram.
- MEET: When Container X meets Container Y!
- ECHO: There is an ECHO inside the Container Z.
- MOVE: The ECHO leads to a Significant Insight that guides a Move.
Container Z is the creative space where we face challenges and opportunities.
For the thematic dialogue, Container X means Thematic Space X. For example, my “Activity” thematic space. X1, X2, X3, and X4 refer to members of the thematic space X.
Container Y means Thematic Space Y. For example, my “Opportunity” thematic space. Y1, Y2, Y3, and Y4 refer to members of the thematic space X.
The key to the thematic dialogue is the differences and similarities between members inside one thematic space.
We also need to pay attention to the differences and similarities between members inside Container Z: the ECHOZONE.
A real ECHO is based on discovering differences and similarities between members.
This is the ECHO Way (v3.0)! A new approach to understanding Creative Journey and Creative Life in general.
