The Infinities Aware Design workflow uses a cyclical process called Mixology (Small Infinities Mixology Cycles ©).

Mixology has three interwoven cycles: Collecting, Mixing, Surfacing.

The Mixology Cycle can be applied to any set of experiences, memories, artistic expression or learning (and all of those mixed together!)

I will use travel in way of introducing the terms. But anything counts!

Surfacing:

In Mixology, Surfaces are the spaces into which mixology collections are poured, mapped, projected, and transformed.

Some Examples: a moment of installation art, a wall of photographs, the memory of an observer, a collection of images, a piece of writing, a private journal entry, a public post.

A surface may be inward facing (just for me)

A surface may be outward facing (when I share it, unfold it, perform it, even work it into my behavior, my personality)

A surface may be part of a system which includes any number of inward and outward facing surfaces. (Are you about to predict that dynamically balancing internal surfacing and external surfacing, that this kind of balance is going to be a huge part of what this is all about? Yep)

Collecting: Some of the richest sources of collections can be gathered in times of intensive experiences such as travel and cross-cultural exposure. When I travel, I collect memories, experiences, notes and photographs. These can be intensive and meaningful (visiting with Monks at Ankor Wat), or easy and delightfully without much meaning (such as collections of thoughts and impressions while relaxing purposely by a stream) …. and everything in between.

Mixing: I have traveled to, photographed, and kept diaries in, mmm let’s see, 41 countries. I have collected over 100,000 images. In a sense I travel to bring back the material to process, integrate, combine, and recombine (Mixing) into endless potential numbers of expressions and spaces - Surfacing.

But that is a crazy amount of travel. Well, that’s one of things I like to collect. I do many other kinds of collecting (such as notes from books I’m reading) and so does everyone else. How much do I need to collect to do Mixing and Surfacing? I’d say that a set of 10 things is a perfectly great number of things to practice Mixology on.