November 2023. I’ve been studying for a good four years. When I started, it was already certain that I would write my thesis in winter because I don’t have time for stuff like that in summer. It was supposed to be winter 2022, the seventh semester. But back then, no one knew that COVID would come along and ruin all my plans.* So here we go.

I’ve been thinking about the type and topic of my creative thesis (something practical, yay!) for a long time. How long? I don’t know. One of my first ideas was the resurrection of Eckweiler. A deserted village here in the Soonwald, the local forest, of which only the church remains. In the middle of nowhere. It’s a meditative place. It would be wonderful to add (discreet) signage and use AR elements to show what it used to look like before the residents were relocated.

The idea fell apart this year: In spring, the Soonwald-Nahe Nature Park trained new nature and landscape guides. I was there and experienced just how slow the bureaucratic wheels can grind. Not the best conditions for a successful collaboration on a bachelor’s thesis.
My boss at the campsite where I live and work would have liked to employ me and my thesis for his tiny house project at some point. Research, conception, corporate design … And that’s when I realized that I absolutely didn’t want any kind of collaboration — successful or not. I didn’t want more external pressure. I didn’t want to fulfill expectations that weren’t mine (or at least those of my professors**). This work should be mine.

And two more things became clear: First, that I wanted to create something that I could finish, right to the bitter end. I still had three cool app projects to complete during my studies this year. I invested endless amounts of time, only to then shout »Finished!« with a click dummy in my hand. A click dummy isn’t finished; a click dummy is a click dummy. And secondly, that the thesis should be something that’s completely my thing.

And I know from my own experience, and from many others, that creativity can also be perceived as quite a burden. Yes, there are people who wish they had fewer ideas.*

And, hey, doesn’t it actually take a coach-slash-designer to tackle this complex topic and support people in the process? Wait, I can think of someone who fits the profile …

Great. But can you make a creative thesis out of this? Isn’t that too little? Or too much? And how can I implement it creatively with my skills, focus, and ideas?

At the beginning of September, I held a personal branding workshop for my aspiring nature guide colleagues and created a small activity book for it. With questions for self-reflection, space for brainstorming, and some input. This gave rise to the thesis idea of an activity book for »more creativity« (whatever that means). Endless variations of the activity book theme followed. For a while, I thought that a thesis in the field of ESD (Education for Sustainable Development) could also be exciting. More brainstorming. More activity books. Until at some point, I asked myself if I really couldn’t come up with anything more clever than a stupid activity book. What medium would be better suited for »more creativity« than bound pages?

Cards? Cards!

You can draw cards, lay them out, combine them, play them, and reuse them again and again. You don’t work through them in a linear fashion, but can interact with them much more freely! Again and again. Without a beginning or an end. That’s much more in line with the nature of creativity than a book. Isn’t it? And … Wasn’t there something? Didn’t you want to … oh dear …

The idea came to me a long time ago. Long before studying design. I first held tarot cards in my hands as a teenager. Back then, I spent many cozy Sundays at my cousin’s place. And at some point, she unpacked her Aleister Crowley Thoth Tarot. Always seeking and devoted to all things mysterious and occult, I was immediately captivated. The illustrations (by Lady Frieda Harris, as I later discovered) were among the most beautiful things I’d ever seen. She allowed me to borrow her deck and shortly thereafter I ordered my own with the accompanying book — hoping to somehow make sense of the 78 cards.

No luck there.

It didn’t really work out; it was far too complicated. At some point, the cards were forgotten; in some crisis, I dug them out again, tucked them away again in the bottom of the closet, found them again, ordered another stack of tarot books, drew daily cards, put them all away again, and so on. For years. Decades.
About three years ago, the shaman next door sent me a photo of beautiful tarot cards with nature motifs. A pack of wolves, mushrooms in the forest … Nature is my petrol station, and I ordered the deck. The Witches’ Wisdom Tarot by Phyllis Curott, artwork by Danielle Barlow. The accompanying book also suggests a suitable magical ritual for each card. By that point, I had already sold all my other decks and tarot books because they were either too superficial or too confusing and weird for me. Yes, it’s a fine line.

A little later, I was sitting in an online business workshop, and as a goodie, the speaker had asked one of the participants, a full-time tarot reader and teacher, to read the cards for us. As far as you could tell via Zoom, the cards were beautiful: the Light Seer’s Tarot by Chris-Anne. So, that one moved in with me, too.

Well, at some point, Witches’ Wisdom and Light Seer’s Tarot, too, disappeared somewhere at the back of the bookshelf, were brought out again … and so on and so forth. But somewhere in this long-term on-off relationship, I had this idea that I’d really like to create a tarot deck. Someday. Not because I’m still fascinated by the mystical and occult, but because I’m fascinated by the system of tarot. And the more I learned about it, the more fascinated I was. I like systems.