The Game of Lenses

Fragments from imaginary dialogues

“I’ve been playing with Brian Johnson’s Big Three lately:

Energy
Work
Love

“

“With mind-mapping, as you usually do?”

“Yes. But this time the focus was not on the Three, but on Lenses [<link; medium length].

What lenses can I view the Big Three through?

Different lenses can offer different insights, and exploring lenses is fun in itself.

I ended up exploring lenses like:

Identity
Opportunity
Habits
Obstacles
Balance
The Sacred
…

For instance, one application of the lens of Balance is evaluating the Three at the end of the day against one another. 

Did you give all Three equal attention?

This was a revelation to me, because I realized my triad was imbalanced, it was considerably skewed towards Work. The Big Three viewed through the lens of Balance has become part of my daily end-of-the-day reflection.

I also created the concept of meta-lenses, which are essentially lenses for discovering lenses.

Macro
Micro

Forwards
Backwards

Spatial
Temporal

Relational

Static
Dynamic

The Practical
…”

“What I like about the game is that you can play it with anything.”

“Precisely. Viewed as a template, the game can be summed up as:

What lenses can you view x through? 

And you don’t have to stop there. You can then start playing with ways of filtering them.

What are the most powerful lenses?
What are the most energizing lenses?
What lenses are most fun?
…

Not to mention that coming up with interesting ways of combining lenses is a game in itself.”

Advertisement