Weather Report: Brainstorms All Day! (9) Change the Labels

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 27 Mar 1994 18:35:01 JST

Exercise 9. New pigeonholes deserve new labels

Well, we're almost done. We've done repetitions, pushed the mental muscles outside the skin they grew in, broken the poles holding the mental tent in place, stood on our heads, and even played games of chance to break out of the routine. Today, we're going to push at a subtle, yet pervasive part of the thinking process - labels.

Let me suggest some background which helps to explain why we might want to mess with the names and labels we use. This is sketchy, as trying to cover the details would make this exercise even longer than I usually ramble.

The buzzing, humming confusion - the total experiential "shell" that we find ourself in - is very rarely attended to in toto. Most of the time, we divide it up, and only pay attention to some part(s) of the environment.

Now, names are labels - convenient mental shorthand for a piece of the environment. Myths are mental patterns applied to this "piecemeal" environment.

The tricky part of this process is polarization - there is a tendency for established patterns and pieces to "eat" new ones. We encounter something in the environment, identify (even enphasizing and distorting, if needed) similarities and differences to match existing labels, and swallow that new experience without ever noticing that it isn't quite the same...

So once we "tag" something, we lose awareness of its uniqueness, its differences. It is hard to "see" Wallie in the midst of all the other people.

While we could try to work at increasing the awareness of uniqueness and so forth (and we've seen some ways to push at breaking boundaries and other blockages of thought that help make up the stolid patterns), one of the easier ways to attack this is through paying attention to the names, the labels, the verbal shorthand that makes it so easy to ignore what is "really" happening "out there."

There are three basic tactics to weakening our label use. First, challenge labels. Don't just use them, don't just accept them, say - whoa! that's a label, but that's not a tin can I just slapped it on. Let me peel that label off and throw it away, so I can look at what's underneath again.

Second, very hard, is to try to abolish labels. Not too long ago, Bill Siers had us write a short description of a storm - without using the ordinary labels for many of the storm phenomena (e.g. rain, lightning, etc.) That is excellent practice - take a set of labels and remove them from your writing.

Third, an exciting one for writers, is to try new labels. Take some chunks of experience and invent labels for them. Depending on what you pick, you may need verbs, nouns, or even something outside the normal grammatical categories. Then write your piece, using the new labels, showing us what they mean in action. In many ways, new labels (new words) imply new thinking - and that's always nice!

The Final (almost) Day of Practice:

the warp of the exercises has been these four strands (often recommended in books of writing as useful for weaving a magic carpet)

a. Description
b. Character
c. Conflict/Problems
d. Solutions

You might consider how those underlie and braid with these woof threads.

1. Find the labels used in a piece - take an article or story and pick out the labels used. Pay special attention to those which are used without definition or specification of any kind - those rascals are danger signals, waiting for semantic stumblers to set them off. This practice will help you notice when you use similar labels in your writing - and let you think about whether they are doing the job you want to do.

2. Rewrite without the labels. (try to keep the meaning; then try to develop new meanings) Take a piece, identify a set of labels, then pull them out. Don't destroy the meaning, but replace every occurrence of the label(s) with specifics, with sensory images, with the tin can that was hiding under the label. Don't forget, you're welcome to use a can opener - and your readers will enjoy being able to taste the food instead of just looking at the picture on the label.

3. Rewrite with all new words - none the same. Take a piece, then rewrite it. Try to retain the same meaning, the same thoughts, but don't use any of the original words. If nothing else, you'll get some good vocabulary practice out of this - and usually you'll find that rewriting like this helps you really see what was hidden in the words, makes you very aware of parts that weren't clearly visualized or thought through, and makes the meaning "come alive" for you.

4. Make a list of "missing label" concepts - and name them. This is one that I enjoy playing with whenever I have a few minutes. Look around, then think about some concepts which don't have names or labels (or at least that you don't know the labels for!). Make up a list of "missing labels," provide at least thumbnail definitions or sketches of what they mean, and think about using one or more in a story that shows the reader what they have been missing in life by not knowing that storm shadows, for example, are the "holes" in reflections in a lake. Or that if storm shadows meet and completely cover a lake, the lake disappears into the storm and is replaced with the soul of the storm...

You can also do more prosaic gaming, of course. Is there a label for the top of a tin can cut loose from the can? I don't think so - now what kind of person would collect those shiny discards, and why? Or perhaps we need another "couch potato" label for the "t.v. game addicts" - not the shows, those game computers that seem to hypnotize their players for hours...

Go for it! Linguistic labels, unlike those on your mattress, are not protected by law, and you have every right to remove them, switch them around, and add some of your own. Have fun - and here's hoping your brainstorms earn some wonderful labels for the author behind them!

Weather Report: Brainstorms All Day! (10) All the pieces!

[mbarker.livejournal.com]

original posting: Sun, 3 Apr 1994 18:35:02 JST

Exercise 10. Putting it all in pieces

In Strunk & White parody:

1. Set yourself a quota of alternatives (Exercise 1. Just One More!)
2. Challenge assumptions and boundaries (Exercise 2. Why? And again, Why?)
3. Challenge dominant ideas and crucial factors (Exercise 3. Get out of the dungeon and out of the shackles)
4. Break patterns into parts and reassemble in new ways (Exercise 4. Divide and Combine)
5. Try reversing the "accepted wisdom" (Exercise 5. Take a Giant Step Backwards)
6. Stretch your wings with analogy (Exercise 6. As if it were a... Duck!)
7. Try different starting points and look for missing information (Exercise 7. Look Here, then there - and please don't look behind the curtain)
8. Cultivate random stimuli (Exercise 8. Take a Chance)
9. Change labels and divisions (Exercise 9. New pigeonholes deserve new labels)
10. Put opposites, unrelated, and rejected notions to work (Exercise 10. Putting it all in pieces)

What all of these methods help you to do is create new patterns of thought and challenge old patterns. By juxtaposition, random stimuli, and taking intuitive leaps, new patterns of thought are revealed. By accepting doubtful points and letting yourself be wrong, even more new patterns are likely to become available.

Incidentally, we are not challenging old patterns of thought on the basis of their wrongness, nor does it matter how well justified (or rationalized) the old patterns of thought may be. The point of these exercises is to remind us to explore and collect alternatives, to search out other truths without in any way discarding those truths with which we are already familiar. Or, to put it another way, mom's grilled cheese sandwich will always taste good, no matter how many other fine foods and exotic meals we may try - but aren't you glad you don't have to eat grilled cheese for every meal?

Final Exercises:

Just three small ones - go back and review the rest of the exercises if you want more...

1. Reunite opposites
This is simple - take opposites, or divided concepts, and consider them joined and merged. What, for example, would a democratic dictatorship look like? Can you imagine gentle hate? Brilliant darkness? Free imprisonment? Or captive freedom? There is a tendency to "splinter" experience into little categories and consider those pieces separately - this is a deliberate attempt to overcome that.

2. Unite the unrelated
A related approach is taking those things that "everyone knows" have nothing to do with each other - and considering them as related. It really doesn't matter if there is a "causal chain" or other link - dream up your own reasons why the health of the elm tree outside and the mental health of the patients inside are linked. Or perhaps the condition of his shoes has a direct effect on the likelihood of winning at cards... or...

3. Re-examine rejected ideas
That can't be - we know the history of science and progress practically consists of hearing the pronouncements of savants and common sense going "pop!" Yet we all constantly and consistently persist in rejecting, banning, and outlawing ideas - usually without ever taking the time to really look at them.

Try this - take an idea that cannot be true. List the reasons - the negatives that make it a really dumb idea. Then take that list, and flip those negatives - consider that the exact opposite might be true for just a little while. Flip the whole list, then take another look at that "dumb idea." Does it start to look a little less impossible? In any case, don't be too hasty to reject ideas. The "stick ups" that everyone loves so much came from someone making up a batch of glue that didn't quite do the job - and taking the time to think about what it might be good for, instead of just tossing it out the back door. Maybe your great brainstorm is hiding in an idea that "everyone knows" is worthless - except you take the time to cultivate that straggling thought and figure out where it fits.

That's the basics. Hopefully, some of you will try these out, and find out that those "fixed patterns of thought" aren't fixed at all. These are some ways to shake them loose and start building new ones. It certainly isn't all there is to writing stories, but I think it can be a useful tool in your toolkit. At least people won't be quite as likely to sigh and say, well, there isn't anything new here... since you took the old idea and recreated it into an IDEA!