This document discusses the need to create more optimistic visions of the future through storytelling. It provides several techniques for developing future stories, such as creative deconstruction, future fragments, and collaborative imagining. The goal is to engage communities, bring together diverse voices, and provide tools to build futures agency. Examples include an activity called "The Future Traveler 2040" that imagines a person's life in the future, and "The Gift 2040" which uses narrative elements to make the future more personal and show reasons for technology.

1. Relax,
It’s only a story
Foresight for the rest of us
Joe Tankersley

2. March 9, 1955

4. July 20, 1969

5. • the
October 1, 2001

6. How can we
create a new
generation of
optimistic
futurists?

7. • more cynical
• more stressed
• more distracted
• more diverse
Too many people act as if
the future is a destination
waiting for us to arrive.
Inevitable, Unavoidable
In a world where

8. Confessions of a rambling
futurist & storyteller
Critique
Practice
Prototype

9. Tomorrow begins with a story
If we want to imagine a better
future and then build it we need to
change the story we are telling
ourselves about the future we want
to live in. Brian David Johnson

10. Our
stories
suck

11. Our futures are
B i p o l a r

12. Monolithic

13. Obsessed with technology

14. Hero
myths

15. How do we rewrite our future stories?
• Creative
Deconstruction
• Future Fragments
• Collaborative
Imagining

16. Creative Deconstruction

19. Practopia
“A positive, even a
revolutionary alternative, yet
within the range of
realistically attainable.”
Alvin Toffler
The Third Wave
embraces diversity
pulses with innovation
enclaves of stability
art over commerce
democratic and humane
respects the biosphere

20. Future Fragments
character based
micro story
captures everyday life
similar to flash fiction

21. Collaborative Imagining
It matters
WHO
creates the
stories of
OUR
tomorrows

22. We need a place to build
community foresight skills
Imaginetic Centers
Where people are
brought together to
speculate freely, even
playfully, about
possible futures
Alvin Toffler

23. GOALS
Engage local communities
Bring together diverse voices
Provide tools for critical imagination
Build futures agency
Use foresight to create insights

24. Individual creativity
Group dialogue
Collaboration

25. Challenge the official future
Objectives
Start thinking about the future
Assess trend knowledge
Introduce agency

26. The future traveler 2040
We’re going to explore your community in
2040 through the eyes of a person you
know today.
This could be a family member, a friend or
significant other. It could also be someone
you know socially or professionally. Select
someone you know well enough to be able
to imagine what her/his/their life might be
like in the year 2040.
To get started we need to know a little bit
about your future traveler.

27. The Gift 2040
Objectives
Making the future personal
Introducing narrative elements
Reasons for technology

28. The Gift 2040
Objectives
Making the future personal
Introducing narrative elements
Reasons for technology
Graduation
A commercial robot that Hope
will use to begin her own
business

29. The celebration
2040
The first collaborative activity

30. Community Project

31. Future fragment

32. Deconstructing your stories

33. If you can dream it, you can build it
Walt Disney
I hope we can inspire others to
dream their own Practopias

34. Joe@uniquevisions.net
joe_tankersley
www.uniquevisions.net
Speculative Futures Orlando
http://bit.ly/2D5IcPQ
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