Well, Im not. And apparently, 70% of the all population are just like me – not an abstract thinking people.
Abstract people are rare, weird and freakishly fascinating creatures. You can call them astronauts, parrots, or even “not of this world”, but they have a very important role – they are the glue of the society.
Think a moment, two of the most popular concepts of human race are the absolutely abstract ones: God and Money. And so to say, that’s what holds us together.
Personally, I’m more interested in storytelling side of an abstract, because, I believe, that’s what makes a story really interesting.
I call it: A Schizophrenic Storytelling.
Since the time of Aristo, we try to figure out what is the formula for the good story. Many “smarties” today are trying to sell those “time-proven-techniques” of storytelling, storyselling and other content marketing B.S. And don’t get me wrong, some of them do work, simply because they look exactly just like a million other stories, industrialized and synthetically stamped, based on an old school Aristo’s formula.
But the problem is – that our perception of the story changes. It evolves!
Modern content productions, the successful ones, are more complex and more colorful then before. And if we are in a content business, there supposed to be a business formula, as every normal business has, isn’t it?
Now, when we established that I’m normal, let me show and share the example of how fascinatingly jumpy is an abstract mind of my abstract friends:
Under the hood of an abstract mind.
“Look how fast they build up their megapolis!” – said my friend, while we were walking by the surrealistic mushrooms-like formations of salt, at remote shore at the edge of the Dead Sea.
“Who?” – I wondered.
“A year ago this place was flat” – he added. – “I wonder if the wood ashes, from our forest campfire also ended their journey here?”
“The ones you threw up to the wind to see if they’ll make a rainbow?” – I couldn’t hold my sarcasm.
“Yes! Exactly. But that wasn’t about a rainbow, it was about algae” – He corrected me seriously. – “Some algae, especially colorful ones, live in the humid air of forest, and they need food.”
“They thrive on potassium salt.” – He added after a short pause, and suspiciously looked at me to see if I get it.
I didn’t.
“And?” – Curiosity got the best of me.
“And when it rains in forests of Judean Hill Country and Judean Desert, some of the water streams to the Dead Sea, brings with it algae, it’s called Dunaliella by the way. That’s what gives the Dead Sea its red color sometimes” – He posed.
“Aaaand??” – Me becoming inpatient.
“And the Dead Sea gives them a home, for the long term second life, so to say.” – He look at me, and explained. – “When they “die”, their skeletons stack up and become a part of potash mineral salts.” – He posed.
“And so they build up those weird mushroom buildings.” – He posed again.
“And if you will look closely inside of one of those salty window holes – someone will definitely look back at you” – He added and sarcastically smiled at me.
“Most of what you see here is Potash, Pot-Ash – it is a salt from ashes, you get it? Potassium comes from the same term”.
Well, who knew that the abstracts, with their ability to see beyond the visible, could be so educating. High school chemistry class in 5 min, for dummies. And I’m still not sure if I got it all, but I’ll never look at the salt in the same way again.
Maybe some of us will never fully become an abstract, but we can learn how to better emulate it, if we need to.
Because after all – abstract makes life colorful.
