{"id":14479,"date":"2024-10-20T09:36:00","date_gmt":"2024-10-20T09:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/?p=14479"},"modified":"2024-12-21T09:47:20","modified_gmt":"2024-12-21T09:47:20","slug":"flow-garden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/2024\/10\/20\/flow-garden\/","title":{"rendered":"flow garden"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/image.png?ssl=1\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"770\" height=\"514\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/image-1024x683.png?resize=770%2C514&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-14480\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/image.png?resize=1024%2C683&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/image.png?resize=300%2C200&amp;ssl=1 300w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/image.png?resize=768%2C512&amp;ssl=1 768w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/image.png?w=1456&amp;ssl=1 1456w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 770px) 100vw, 770px\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">photo by St\u00e9phane Querbes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>7. flow garden(?) \u2014 meandering essay reflecting on what it&#8217;s like to really just allow words to flow, like food coloring in water, in patterns that you cannot precisely anticipate in advance. cascades of minimal-exertion, &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.vice.com\/en\/article\/do-easy-william-s-burroughs-and-gus-van-sant-show-you-how-to-get-things-done\/\">Doing Easy<\/a>&#8220;, allow the waves to carry you, be surprised<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Have you ever done that science experiment where you put some kind of salt in some kind of solution, and a tree-like precipitate emerges out of it? I just looked it up\u2026 the closest seeming example involves using a sodium silicate solution and metal salts like copper chloride, iron sulphate and so on. For some reason I\u2019ve had that mental image on my mind lately. This <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/OMBFwWTJy-0?si=xMxnZCRRlO-IJbgw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">3 minute youtube video<\/a> is a nice skim through some interesting visuals of how different metal salts \u201csprout\u201d differently.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>A similar visual I have in my mind is how a bit of food coloring spreads through clear water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/substackcdn.com\/image\/fetch\/f_auto%2Cq_auto%3Agood%2Cfl_progressive%3Asteep\/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5cec3dd4-d82c-4a42-b6d6-bf826e5ece02_1000x665.png?ssl=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/substackcdn.com\/image\/fetch\/w_1456%2Cc_limit%2Cf_auto%2Cq_auto%3Agood%2Cfl_progressive%3Asteep\/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5cec3dd4-d82c-4a42-b6d6-bf826e5ece02_1000x665.png?w=770&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Photography\" title=\"Photography\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>I kinda wish it was a gif instead so we could watch it. There <em>are<\/em> some gifs of food coloring spreading through water, but none of them are particularly pretty. Shaky cameras and such.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anyway. Why is all this so compelling to me right now? Well, I\u2019m trying to get a sense of\u2026 flow. Because I\u2019ve been feeling stuck for a long time now, and I\u2019m just about ready to try anything. I start looking for images or ideas that might maybe laterally nudge me in some direction that I\u2019m not considering. What does water do when it runs up against an obstacle? It flows around it. When I try to recreate a \u2018felt sense\u2019 of what flow has felt like in the past for me in my writing, it does feel like what those patterns of food coloring look like. There is no \u2018exertion\u2019. There is a gentleness to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I kinda talked about this in <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/visakanv.substack.com\/p\/a-matryoshka-of-possibilities\"><em>a matryoshka of possibilities<\/em><\/a><em> \u2013<\/em> the idea is not necessarily to plot a course in advance, but to feel for what is next. In <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/visakanv.substack.com\/p\/a-stupid-bravery\"><em>a stupid bravery<\/em><\/a><em> <\/em>I quote Christopher Alexander: \u201cwe may gradually improve patterns by testing them against experience \u2013 see whether our surroundings live, or not, <strong><em>by recognizing how we feel.<\/em><\/strong>\u201d The task I have in front of me is to navigate by feeling, and I keep trying to avoid that by trying to think my way out of my puzzles. But my thinking is necessarily constrained by my assumptions, which include assumptions that I\u2019m not consciously aware of. We know more than we think, and we feel more than we know. I have to feel my way out of these puzzles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What puzzles? Well. There are several puzzles that overlap and intertwine. And it gets recursive, too\u2014 because my definition of my puzzles are constructed out of my thoughts. My intellectual interpretations of my perceptions, colored once again by my subconscious judgements which have become a kind of psychic prison that I\u2019m trapped in, and would like to break free from. If I have a problem that persists for a long time despite varied attempts to solve it, I must begin to consider that I\u2019m framing the puzzle the wrong way. Asking the wrong question. Some of the questions I started with were things like, \u201cHow do I publish decent substack posts at a regular cadence\u201d, and \u201chow do I write about things that aren\u2019t just me grumbling about my creative process\u201d? I have some soulless answers to those questions that I don\u2019t particularly care for. My real challenge is to look for a compelling question that feels right from the inside. So, what\u2019s the question today, Visa? Why are we here? The question is\u2026 maybe \u201cWhat can we see?\u201d That feels somewhat warm and not-soulless, but it doesn\u2019t feel like the heart of the thing. I\u2019m unlikely to get to the heart of the thing on my first attempt; that\u2019s the thing about persistent puzzles. There\u2019s layers upon layers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Here again I feel compelled to nerd out a bit about the movie <em>Inception (2010)<\/em> \u2013 the team\u2019s goal is to incept Fischer with the idea to dissolve his father\u2019s company, but they don\u2019t actually know right away how they\u2019re going to do it. They go into the first level of the dream basically to look for clues that they can use at the deeper levels. And there they find a photograph of Fischer and his father, playing with a paper pinwheel. (I\u2019m fudging some details here\u2013 they find the photo in Fischer\u2019s wallet\u2013 but eh, not relevant to what I\u2019m saying here.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/substackcdn.com\/image\/fetch\/f_auto%2Cq_auto%3Agood%2Cfl_progressive%3Asteep\/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd5ebb8c3-1d8a-414d-b620-9c12d331501e_777x437.gif?ssl=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/substackcdn.com\/image\/fetch\/w_1456%2Cc_limit%2Cf_auto%2Cq_auto%3Agood%2Cfl_lossy\/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd5ebb8c3-1d8a-414d-b620-9c12d331501e_777x437.gif?w=770&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"There is God, and there are the Peaky Blinders. \u2014 Cillian Murphy as Robert  Fischer in...\" title=\"There is God, and there are the Peaky Blinders. \u2014 Cillian Murphy as Robert  Fischer in...\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Only after finding this photo\u2014 having already set out on the trip!\u2014 do they figure out how the Inception is to be done. Fischer at this point remains convinced that his father is disappointed in him, doesn\u2019t particularly care for him, and so on. The team figures out that they can use the pinwheel to convince Fischer otherwise. If his father kept the pinwheel in his safe all along, it would be proof that he cherished a memory with Fischer, and by extension, that he actually loved his son.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s an interesting discussion to be had about what it means that Fischer\u2019s feelings of catharsis are based on what amounts to basically a fictitious illusion constructed by Cobb\u2019s team. There are some parallels with actual therapeutic techniques like \u201cmemory reconsolidation\u201d where some people seem to have made real breakthroughs on deep-rooted emotional issues by imagining past scenarios playing out differently. But I don\u2019t really want to get much into that in this post. Rather I simply want to reflect on the fact that the Inceptors didn\u2019t precisely know how they were going to achieve their goal until midway through the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I believe that this echoes the creative process, or at least my own idealized creative process. I seldom like to start a project and then finish it exactly as I had envisioned it at the start. I like to be changed by the process of working on it. I like to change my mind. I like to get new perspectives. I like to find surprises that make me go, \u201cOh wow, I should totally put this in there, I should totally rework this around that,\u201d and so on. With my book Introspect, for example\u2013 I <a href=\"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/blog\/iterating-introspect\/\">rewrote the entire book from scratch at least 7 or 8 times<\/a>, changing some very fundamental things about it each time. I\u2019d write it one way, find it lacking somehow, or stale, or stiff, and then start over. Initially I thought the question was \u201chow do you figure out what you want?\u201d\u2013 and after answering that question a dozen different ways, I found myself thinking, \u201cthat\u2019s the wrong question\u2013 wants aren\u2019t something you \u2018figure out\u2019, wants are something that arise quite naturally when they aren\u2019t blocked or suppressed\u201d. So Introspect then evolved to become a book about unlearning suppression. For a while I was frustrated with how the book was talking about introspection but it wasn\u2019t itself \u2018introspective\u2019\u2013 since practically every suggestion could be fruitfully contradicted. But if I simply contradicted everything I said as I said it, it became unreadable. I can\u2019t recall precisely when or how it hit me\u2013 I think I was thinking of the theatre, and how you could have narrators or characters address the audience in front of the curtains in between Acts\u2014 and I realized that I could actually just <em>demonstrate<\/em> what I mean by introspection, by introspecting in real time between Acts. I think it\u2019s one of the cleverest things I do in the book, and many readers have told me that they found it surprising, refreshing, humanizing and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Solving the core puzzle of Introspect\u2019s structure was one of the most satisfying things I\u2019ve ever done in my life. (There are actually still some unsolved \u2018sections\u2019, which I intend to get to for my next update of the book.) Yes, it\u2019s great to get all this positive reader feedback and people telling me that it\u2019s changed their life and so on. And I do think it\u2019s possible that readers might\u2019ve felt that way even if I didn\u2019t solve the puzzle, though probably not as much. I should also add that before I could solve the core structural puzzle, I had to solve the definitional puzzle\u2013 the puzzle of \u201cwhat is this book even, anyway?&#8221; What is it\u2019s name?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I can\u2019t recall when exactly I figured out that this current era of this substack should be called Frame Studies, but that was a very satisfying day. Just as it was satisfying to come up with the names for Friendly Ambitious Nerd and Introspect. But I realize there are still major puzzles in Frame Studies that I haven\u2019t solved yet, and it makes sense that I\u2019ll continue to feel stuck until I concoct a breakthrough. I first seem to have used the phrase \u201cFrame Studies\u201d <a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/visakanv\/status\/1208425112958955520\">in 2019<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>abandoned<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A similar visual I have in my mind is how a bit of food coloring spreads through clear water. I kinda wish it was a gif instead so we could watch it. There are some gifs of food coloring spreading through water, but none of them are particularly pretty. Shaky&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[730],"class_list":["post-14479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-substack"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5gxNz-3Lx","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14479"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14479\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14481,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14479\/revisions\/14481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.visakanv.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}