The Frame Dojo
A vision for a Frame Dojo: an idea that fell into my lap when reading Don't Think of an Elephant.
What is a Frame Dojo? A training course or community for getting better at reframing arguments and issues. To do these mental gymnastics both on the fly and in slower time.
What is a frame? An automatic, effortless, everyday mode of understanding. Often a metaphor. E.g.: tax relief frames reducing taxes as a form of unburdening, with the various associations that accompany this. Such a frame shapes how people think of the policy, and also how they don't think about it. It says "think of it this way please, and don't think of it this other way".
Why does the world need a Frame Dojo? Because most people act against their own interests and their own values. In part because they have suboptimal frames living rent-free in their head.
The Frame Dojo is amoral: it has the be applied for good to be good.
How is it different to other media or negotiation training? It teaches the "full stack" of framing: all the way up from values, to ideas and concepts, to frames, to application to specific issues. It is vertically integrated framing. We need all this because clear values and ideas enable better frames: they are interconnected.
I don't have a firm sense of how it would look. But one version could include 1-3 days or 4-8 evenings of training which includes the following exercises:
- Clarify the values you hold
- Starting from a long list of ideas and concepts (no need to be original) pick ones which relate to your values
- For a given issue and argument made using a frame of the opposition, write a short essay or give a talk reframing the issue in terms of your values and ideas. This shouldn't be long: the point is to build muscles applying values and ideas to reframing, rather than making a perfect essay or talk.
- Drills: someone makes an argument, and you have 30 seconds to reframe and argue back. Initially you have 1 minute to prep, and the drill is repeated, gradually reducing the prep time to zero.
Discuss after each exercise.
There's room for a more informal communal version.