Writing a Book About Regeneration - by Playing Cards.
We played cards, and *POOF* - we wrote a book.
Back in the early summer of 2022, Sam shared a dream of hosting a group of regenerative villages builders at the Traditional Dream Factory. As a Catalyst Wizard, and a Summer Steward of TDF how could I not jump fully on board?
Two months later, we hosted 30 amazing people representing a variety of projects from the regenerative ecosystem and over 11 days together we wrote a 200 pages book.
We did all this by playing cards, a few hour per day. No AI necessary.
(You can find the book at Treehouse DAO.)
I have narrated the story of that Mastermind live in a twitter thread, so I won't reproduce it here. Instead I'll focus on the perspective of the Wild Wizards and the magic of facilitating with cards.
(☝️ Documentation is my superpower.)
Why Cards
When I say cards, I'm thinking of blank index cards (rather than playing cards), providing a limited physical space for engraving ideas.
Cards are somewhat similar to post-its, only that you can build decks, shuffle, and feel like you're a wizard performing magic tricks. The vibe is fundamentally different and in my personal opinion functionality is way better. Cards feel sturdier, which makes them better for idea mapping:
And when collecting them you have to create some kind of order and decide which deck does each card belong to.
Apart from Blanks, used to generate ideas for writing actual pages of the book, I played with a few other decks in parallel:
Facilitation deck - helping me to outline the structure of each session, guide the process along, and deploy tricks
Roles - identifying roles needed for the Mastermind
Village questions - prompts for deep conversations around regenerative movement
Village game - ideas for a game
Unsorted - various cards that felt worth keeping, although didn't really fit into an existing deck
Each deck was simultaneously an idea generator for the ongoing mastermind, as well as a space for harvesting ideas for future masterminds, games, etc. I'd browse through the cards every day and make immediate improvements for the next day of the mastermind.
Quick iteration + having a lot of fun.
Cards to Pages
Since we were set on writing a book, we needed to turn each play session into pages.
Our process varied slightly every day, as the group was becoming more tuned in with each other, but the basic flow remained the same:
Play cards to map the chapter we're focusing on
Turn cards into page drafts
Review all pages and create chapter order
Create illustrations and write page drafts (digitally)
Compile digital pages in a shared Figma board
(I'm so grateful for working with Daneel, who was our Figma Wizard of the highest caliber 🙏).
The pace was insane. With a team of two amazing illustrators (Silvia and Niko), we were able to produce a draft of each chapter on daily basis - from start to a very rough digital version.
Cards After Hours
After the daily creation was concluded, the cards would serve another purpose - prototyping a storytelling game about building a village.
We'd gathered in the Treehouse (one of my beloved spaces in TDF), or in another amazing spot (TDF is full of great spots), and spent a few hours telling stories, exploring potential conflict areas, building infrastructure, and simply living together as a fictional community.
Once again, we used a mix of Blanks supplemented with cards created during the book writing sessions, as well as other decks. And again, the process of playing cards naturally led to creating more cards, which were then added to different decks.
Some amazing cards were created in these sessions, for example:
A Dry Cafe - distilled from conversations and observations about growing water scarcity
A Mushroom Ceremony - the storytelling prompt that resulted in the village becoming a beautiful mushroom journey of one of the villagers
A set of vouchers - prompting acts of care within our group
Since their inception, these cards (and many others) have been played on different occasions with different groups and in different contexts. Thinking about their journey actually gets me quite nostalgic.
There are soooo many cards that I witnessed creating a real impact, in a group or a specific person. They might disappear for a while, until eventually they show up again in the most unexpected yet perfectly fitting time - prompting a thought or an interaction that is a real game changer.
That's the magic of cards.
I'll be sharing some of these card stories in this newsletter, so here's your wholehearted invitation to subscribe and be a part of this journey. And if it so happens that you have a card story to share, don't hesitate to write me 🤍.
Afterwards...
The mastermind ended with a book draft, which we printed and hanged on the wall, gallery style, for feedback.
We then incorporated that feedback into the first version that we printed and took with us to the Gathering of the Tribes - a regenerative, burn-inspired festival in Portugal.
(Jumpsuits are definitely a critical style component 😅)
The Cards went along, of course, creating more magical moments of connection and playful mischief. New decks were created, including Akinado Nada Nissa - a very special one that I carry with me in my portable Wizard Kit wherever I go.
Since then, we finished the digital edition of the book, which is now available at Treehouse DAO. I have a feeling that it wants to become a physical book, and, of course - a card game. Stay tuned as the seeds sprout 🌳.
In the meantime, a different seed planted during the Regen Village Mastermind and my stewardship at the Traditional Dream Factory matured, and turned into a beautiful plant - the Wild Wizards Ecosystem. And finally, the very first deck is available to purchase: The Wild Cards, designed to create meaningful interactions with a dash of playful mischief.
This deck is a special one - it comes with a 1:1 Card Wizard Training Session where I'll share my card wizardry with you, and we'll tweak it together for your needs and unique facilitation style.
You can get it here, and feel free to use the launch discount code WILDLAUNCH (valid until the end of December 2023).
The story of that deck and the Wild Wizards, belongs in a different article, so let's leave it here for now.
Sending you a playful hug from Amsterdam and thank you for Being!
Michał,
your Card Wizard.
ps. Want a Card Wizard at your event / project? Get in touch ✨