The Thematic Space of Knowledge Engagement

Introducing the Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit (v1.0, 2026)

by Oliver Ding

The recent Revisiting-and-Rebuilding of the Knowledge Strategy trilogy pulled my focus back toward several years of work on Knowledge Engagement, work I had deliberately stepped away from earlier this year, when I redirected my creative attention toward Cultural Innovation.

That creative journey unfolded through three projects: ACS (Anticipatory Cultural Sociology), SDP (Strategic Developmental Psychology), and GO Theory. In the first half of 2026, I produced several new book drafts and a series of knowledge frameworks. Among them, the Gejunction framework led me back to the Knowledge Engagement work, especially to the Knowledge Strategy book drafts I wrote in 2025.

The trilogy closed in June 2025. What I now call the Knowledge Strategy series extends that timeline: later manuscripts carry it through the second half of 2025 and up to SDP. This article follows one thread through the longer timeline, the concept of Thematic Space.

The previous articles read Knowledge Engagement from three aspects of Gejunction: RelationFields, Living Coordinates and Weave-points. This article takes the fourth aspect, Thematic Spaces.

Thematic Space Theory was set out as a methodological theory. In the Toolkit of February 26, 2025, it serves researchers and thinkers in general, and leaves an ecological approach to social, creative and strategic cognition to Attachance Theory. That position is double-edged. It made Thematic Space portable enough to be linked with Mind in Creative Life Theory v3.0, and so to lead to the Weave-the-Mind framework. It also meant that Thematic Space carried no account of its own of subjects, and left the social and strategic sides of cognition to other theories.

GO Theory, matured in 2026, offers a structure for the World of Life and, in Gejunction, a unit of synthesis that gives Thematic Space a place as one of four aspects. This article uses the Weave-the-Strategy Framework (v1.0, October 15, 2025) to follow how a methodological theory finds its place in that structure.

Part 1 sets out Thematic Space at three levels: Thematic Space Theory, the History{Life[Self(Body)]} framework, and Gejunction. Part 2 presents the Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit. Parts 3 and 4 provide related case studies. Part 5 connects the toolkit to the Coordinate-Center-Gejunction Framework.

Contents

Part 1: Thematic Space at Three Levels

1.1 Thematic Space Theory: The Architecture
1.2 Thematic Space Theory: A Brief History
1.3 The History{Life[Self(Body)]} Framework (HLS)
1.4 The Gejunction Framework (Gejunction)
1.5 The Three Levels Together

Part 2: The Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit

2.1 Weave-the-Strategy: Understanding Strategic Moves
2.2 Creative Workfield: The House of Slow Cognition
2.3 Thematic Map: Visualizing Knowledge Models as Maps
2.4 Weave-the-Strategy in Context

Part 3: Case Studies of Thematic Map

3.1 The Knowledge Discovery Canvas (2022)
3.2 The House of Knowledge Discovery (2024)
3.3 The House of Project Engagement (2024)
3.4 The House of Creative Life Curation (2024)
3.5 The House of Creative Life Strategy (2024)
3.6 The House of Ecological Practice (2024)
3.7 The House of Slow Cognition (2025)
3.8 The House of Creative Life Strategy (2025)

Part 4: A Case Study of Strategic Move

4.1 What the Case Is About
4.2 The Five Strategic Moves
4.3 The Three-Level General Strategy
4.4 The Outcome: Theory as Enterprise

Part 5: Thematic Space in Knowledge Strategy

5.1 The Coordinate-Center-Gejunction Framework as a Developmental Structure
5.2 A Complete Set of Toolkits for the Four Aspects of Ge junction
5.3 New Horizons for Knowledge Strategy

Postscript

Toward a Ge junction Analysis Method

Part 1: Thematic Space at Three Levels

Thematic Space is not a single-level concept. It has different positions and functions at different theoretical levels. In Thematic Space Theory (TST), it is an abstract theoretical concept. In the History{Life[Self(Body)]} framework (HLS), it is a theoretical concept within a collaborative whole. In the Gejunction framework, it is an operational concept that faces individual actors directly.

1.1 Thematic Space Theory: The Architecture

Thematic Space Theory is based on the Theme (Concept) ontology and the concept of Thematic Space. A Thematic Space is a cognitive space where a person's ideas, activities and practices revolve around one theme. A theme can be an established theory such as Activity Theory, a general concept such as Platform or Life, or something in between, such as Design Thinking or UX.

The theory has three levels:

• The "Theme (Concept)" Ontology
• The "Map(Move)" Realism / The "THEORY(PRACTICE)" Realism
• The "Model (Map)" Hermeneutics

The concept of "Thematic Space" was born as an application of the Container (Containee) ontology: Theme (Concept). I distinguish between "Theme" and "Concept." While "Theme" emphasizes subjective experience and understanding, "Concept" pertains more to objective meaning and definition.

Thematic Space Theory not only considers the semantic relationship between themes but also the genetic relationship between them. While the semantic relationship is associated with the "themes" part, the genetic relationship relates to the "practice" part, meaning the real historical development of projects.

The "Map(Move)" Realism is a general form: any Move, any activity, admits a Map representing its own structure. "THEORY(PRACTICE)" — the "Theory, Practice, End, Means" model — is the specific shape this Realism took when I first built it to view Concept Development as a social practice. This specific shape is, precisely, the Knowledge Discovery Canvas (KDC), which I designed in early 2022. The "THEORY(PRACTICE)" Realism also emphasizes the dual trajectories behind Concept Development:

• The Developmental Trajectory of "PRACTICE"
• The Developmental Trajectory of "THEORY"

At the Developmental Trajectory of "PRACTICE," I see all acquired knowledge as heuristic tools for real-life activity in managing all kinds of projects. At the Developmental Trajectory of "THEORY," I see all real actions of running projects as data to test different theoretical approaches and knowledge frameworks.

The "Theme (Concept)" Ontology and the "THEORY(PRACTICE)" Realism lay the foundation for Hermeneutics. The "Theme (Concept)" Ontology defines four types of actors and four types of terms, forming a matrix of meaning. The "THEORY(PRACTICE)" Realism defines four thematic areas. If we combine these two, we see "Model (Map)" Hermeneutics — the interpretation of Realism itself:

• Map: Each thematic area provides a map for Concept Development.
• Model: Each actor can adopt various perspectives and knowledge frameworks for their Concept Development activities.

The "Theme — Map — Model" schema highlights the uniqueness of Thematic Space Theory.

This is why the architecture reaches further than the purpose it was first built for. "THEORY(PRACTICE)" was shaped specifically for Concept Development, but the underlying Realism it instances — any Move admits a Map of its own structure — is not. Any knowledge framework can be understood as a set of Thematic Spaces: a Map. Once a social reality is read against such a map, Social Moves become something that can be modeled directly on it, with the Mental Moves they correspond to observed in turn — and the relationship runs the other way as well, from Mental Moves back to the Social Moves they imply. This is the bridge TST actually provides, between Mental Moves and Social Moves, through whatever Map a given knowledge framework happens to supply.

Read this way, TST's own three levels define the Map-Move-Model schema: the Map (Move) Realism supplies the Map, representing whatever Moves it is built to describe; the Model (Map) Hermeneutics supplies the Model, interpreting the Moves. Map, Moves, and Models are not a framework borrowed from outside TST to organize this article — they are TST's own architecture, read at a different grain. 

1.2 Thematic Space Theory: A Brief History

Thematic Space began in January 2022 as the name of a canvas for studying the development of tacit knowledge, later renamed the Knowledge Discovery Canvas. Within months it had become an ontological entity in the Life-as-Project approach, where Life = Project = Thematic Space. In 2023 it became a theoretical concept, bound to Attachance through two book drafts, Mental Moves and Social Moves, which applied the Attachance Perspective to creative and social cognition. Attachance itself refers to moves. The Strategic Moves project followed in 2024.

In 2025, Thematic Space Theory became independent of Curativity Theory because Themes of Practice, the precursor of the Theme–Concept distinction, belonged to that theory. It separated from Attachance Theory because the three Moves manuscripts of 2023–2024, written to develop Attachance Theory, needed Thematic Space to supply the maps, moves and models for their case studies.

On February 26, 2025, the Thematic Space Theory Toolkit (v1.0) gave the theory the form of a specific theory. I made it while developing the Ecological Strategic Cognition Framework (v2.3), a thematic map of nine spaces.

For each space, I chose one concept from TST:

In the terms of the HERO U diagram, the Toolkit is a Specific Theory: it sits within the Ecological Practice Approach, a Meta-theory, and supports the Ecological Strategic Cognition Framework, an Abstract Model.

Two of its concepts matter for what follows. Ecological Relevance describes the Self–Other relationship, because TST offers no theory of Subjects of its own. Slow Cognition names Mind: the long-term development of tacit knowledge and cognitive methods.

The Toolkit also states the theory's position. Attachance Theory aims at an ecological approach to social, creative and strategic cognition, and Concept Dynamics Theory at an ecological approach to Concept Science. Thematic Space Theory serves as a methodological theory for researchers and thinkers in general.

That position guided Creative Life Theory v3.0 in the second half of 2025: linking Thematic Space Theory with Mind led to the Weave-the-Mind framework.

It is a double-edged position. It makes the theory portable, and it leaves the theory without an account of its own of subjects or of the social and strategic sides of cognition.

1.2 The History{Life[Self(Body)]} framework (HLS)

In the History{Life[Self(Body)]} framework (HLS), Thematic Space is a specific application of TST. It remains a theoretical concept, but it is no longer isolated. It now forms a collaborative whole with three other concepts. Here it is used in the singular.

The HLS Framework organizes social life into four regions, generated by crossing two pairs of systems: Cultural System and Historical System on one axis, Mental System and Behavioral System on the other. At the exact center of this 2×2 grid sits the Biological System — Self(Body) itself, the living organism from which everything else in the framework radiates outward.

Putting Rosen's Natural/Formal axis and Lui's inside/outside distinction together with HLS's own Cultural-Historical / Mental-Behavioral grid produces four regions, each defined as a specific intersection:

• Symbolic Universe = Cultural System ∩ Historical System (outside subjective experience). Adopted directly from Ping-keung Lui, who in turn drew the term from Berger and Luckmann's The Social Construction of Reality.
• Social Territory = Mental System ∩ Behavioral System (inside subjective experience). Also adopted from Lui.
• Thematic Space = Cultural System ∩ Mental System (a place for a concept in your mind, where all concepts originate from the Cultural System). Developed independently within this project beginning in January 2022.
• Social Landscape = Historical System ∩ Behavioral System. Also developed independently, emerging from the House of Project Engagement project in 2024, and refined into a full framework the same year.

HLS's four regions are not static territories. They are continually generated and transformed by four mechanisms radiating outward from the center — Self(Body) — toward each region:

• Mental Moves toward Thematic Space
• Generative Narrative toward Symbolic Universe
• Social Moves toward Social Landscape
• Strategic Curation toward Social Territory

In HLS, Thematic Space uses the singular form. It is an abstract theoretical concept — a structural region of the social world. It corresponds to the mechanism of Mental Moves. On the horizontal axis, Thematic Space (left, Mental Moves) forms a symmetry with Social Landscape (right, Social Moves).

1.3 The Gejunction Framework (Gejunction)

A structure of four regions is not yet a single unit. Gejunction is the unit: the most recent unit of synthesis within GO Theory, the World of Life (World of Activity) Approach, and the interface between HLS and the individual. Here Thematic Spaces is used in the plural, as an operational concept that faces individual actors directly, the space that knowledge workers traverse and construct in their knowledge activities.

Gejunction presents four aspects of one and the same social unit, seen from four angles, none reducible to the others. Each corresponds to one HLS region and its mechanism:

• As a Weave-point, it represents the symbolic aspect ((Symbolic Universe; Generative Narrative). Specifically, a Weave-point is an intersection point in the Weave diagram family — diagrams built by crossing a diachronic line against a synchronic line — used to develop the series of Weave diagrams and the GO Square model. Each weave-point marks a theme or concept, functioning as a concrete tool for expressing the Symbolic Universe; each theme or concept, in turn, links onward to a Thematic Space.
• As a Living Coordinate, it represents the territorial aspect (Social Territory; Strategic Curation). A person's visible centers — a Knowledge Center, for instance — are only the surface of this aspect; what an outsider sees is typically some further surface product of that center, such as an email list. The center itself needs to be anchored in a Living Coordinate before it can be strategically curated at all — without that anchor, Strategic Curation has no site to work on.
• As a RelationField, it represents the relational aspect (Social Landscape; Social Moves). RelationField is a distinct model for environmental analysis in its own right, with a basic unit of Subject-Subject (Subject-Object) — the Object here can be a concrete thing or an abstract one.
• As a Thematic Space, it represents the thematic aspect (corresponding mechanism: Mental Moves). A Thematic Space is a cognitive container named by a single theme, but what it actually holds is a shifting collection of related thematic clues, concepts, and information — cognitive elements that change over time, combined into structures that vary from space to space rather than following one fixed pattern. Mental Moves itself carries two senses: the movement of mental elements between different thematic spaces, and the movement of a person's attention or focus between thematic spaces, and between mind and its elements.

These four aspects are not four separate entities requiring their own decomposition. They are four analytical perspectives on one and the same social unit — the same underlying configuration, viewed from four different angles, none reducible to the others. Each aspect, in turn, draws on a distinct knowledge system with its own developmental history.

At a deeper level, these four aspects are the interface at which Self(Body) is situated within the social world — the surface where the psychological Self(Body) meets HLS's four regions. Self(Body), moving through the social world along two axes — the diachronic (time) and the synchronic (space) — is thereby constituted as what sociology calls an actor. Each axis brings a pair of critical elements into view.

Along the time axis, Flow becomes Focus, and this transition requires thematic focus — the capacity to hold a theme steady enough for a flow of experience to condense into something pursuable. Along the space axis, Center and Circle emerge. Every center has a boundary, and a boundary is what brings identity into being.

Flow, Focus, Center, Circle together constitute the FFCC model — the four basic ecological forms of World of Activity. These ecological forms are closely bound to Self(Body): they are what Self(Body)'s movement through time and space actually produces, and it is this production that the four aspects of Gejunction are built to capture.

The Coordinate–Center–Gejunction framework gives a context of Gejunction within the GO Theory. More details can be found in Creative Self and Social World: From Being by Doing to Coordinate–Center–Gejunction.

1.4 The Three Levels Together

The three levels answer different questions. TST gives a method for reading any knowledge framework as a set of Thematic Spaces. HLS gives Thematic Space an address in the social world, one region beside Symbolic Universe, Social Territory and Social Landscape. Gejunction turns the region into an operational concept that faces an individual actor, one aspect among four.

Part 2: The Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit

The concept of Thematic Space does not remain at the abstract level. It appears in a series of toolkits, in the form of models and knowledge frameworks; these tools are the concrete ways in which the concept works in practice.

In October 2025, I introduced the Weave-the-Strategy Framework (v1.0), which curates several sub-models of my Strategic Life Theory around four concepts: Thematic Space, Social Landscape, Strategic Agency and Creative Workfield. Based on this framework, this part presents a three-level toolkit:

• Level 1: the Weave-the-Strategy Model
• Level 2: the Creative Workfield Map (the House of Slow Cognition)
• Level 3: the Thematic Map Method (also called Thematic Mapping)

The Thematic Map Method has been used to make the thematic maps of the past several years, and these maps led to a series of case studies of mental moves, social moves and strategic moves.

2.1 Weave-the-Strategy: Understanding Strategic Moves

Weave-the-Strategy belongs to the Weave-the-Mind toolkit, and the Weave-the-Mind toolkit belongs to the Mental Platform sequence. But Weave-the-Strategy is a comprehensive model specifically for understanding Strategic Moves.

The core definition of Weave-the-Strategy: Strategy as a process of Slow Cognition, encompassing both mental moves across thematic spaces and social moves across social landscapes.

The Weave-the-Strategy Framework uses the Weave diagram to curate several sub-models of Strategic Life Theory. It is a derived form of the Weave Basic Form, introduced on October 9, 2025, and its version 1.0 is dated October 15, 2025. In every Weave diagram, horizontal lines are diachronic and vertical lines are synchronic; a weave-point is where one of each crosses. In this framework the two vertical lines are the synchronic layouts of two kinds of Moves. The two horizontal lines are the diachronic lines this version considers.

The model has four dimensions:

• Thematic Space → "Mental Moves" Line
• Social Landscape → "Social Moves" Line
• Strategic Agency → "Subject" Line
• Creative Workfield → "Map" Line

Thematic Space, the "Mental Moves" line. The line is the synchronic spatial configuration of mental moves, understood through Thematic Space. The concept comes from the Mental Moves book draft of 2023, which describes moving between Thematic Spaces and binds Thematic Space to Attachance. In the Thematic Space Toolkit (v1.0, 2025) the same pairing appears as two of its nine slots: Maps → Thematic Spaces and Moves → Attachance.

Social Landscape, the "Social Moves" line. The line is the synchronic spatial configuration of social moves, related to Social Landscape. It comes from the Social Moves book draft of 2023, on moving between Social Landscapes.

Creative Workfield, the "Map" line. The line is a meta-map, the House of Slow Cognition, taken up at level 2.

Strategic Agency, the "Subject" line. The aspects of agency were first introduced as eight in Advanced Life Strategy (late 2022), later extended to nine, and became the core model of Strategic Life Theory.

The concept of "Strategic Agency" refers to nine aspects of strategic action, featured in my 2025 book draft, Strategy as Curation:

• Anticipating
• Performing
• Discovering
• Producing
• Modeling
• Unfolding
• Storytelling
• Curating
• Perceiving

These nine aspects are assigned to four groups, corresponding to the four entities of the Curativity of Mind:

• Action: Discovering, Producing, Unfolding
• Perception: Perceiving, Performing
• Conception: Modeling, Storytelling
• Curation: Anticipating, Curating

Strategic Agency also fills a gap the Thematic Space Theory Toolkit (v1.0, 2025)left open. The Toolkit's Subjects slot holds Ecological Relevance because Thematic Space Theory has no theory of Subjects; on the Subject line of this framework, the concept is Strategic Agency.

The model consists of four Weave-points, each representing a structural nexus where one synchrony dimension intersects with one diachrony dimension:

• Thematic Space (Mental Moves) × Creative Workfield → Slow Cognition
• Thematic Space (Mental Moves) × Strategic Agency → Strategic Moves
• Social Landscape (Social Moves) × Creative Workfield → Project Engagement
• Social Landscape (Social Moves) × Strategic Agency → Ecological Opportunity

For this article, the "Slow Cognition" weave-point and the "Strategic Moves" weave-point matter because they are related to the Map-Move-Map schema. Level 2 and level 3 will unpack more details for understanding these two weave-points.

2.2 Creative Workfield: The House of Slow Cognition

Creative Workfield is the extension of the Map-Move-Model triad. In Weave-the-Strategy, Creative Workfield corresponds to the "Map" Line. It is a specific tool for Slow Cognition.

The concept of "Creative Workfield" refers to a thematic map: The House of Slow Cognition.

The Creative Workfield is a thematic map, the House of Slow Cognition, designed at the turn of 2025. It is a meta-map: it places the key concepts of slow cognition on one map, in seven rooms: Aspects, Attachances, Approaches, Maps, Models, Methods and Meanings. It integrates two earlier pieces, the 5A Slow Cognition Model (Aspirations, Aspects, Approaches, Attachances, Achievement) and the 5M method (Meaning, Moves, Map, Models, Methods). Slow Cognition here is the sense of Mind in the Toolkit: the long-term development of tacit knowledge and cognitive methods.

The 5M method has a worked example in Mapping Strategic Moves #14, the House of Creative Life Curation.

• Meaning: Achieving a creative life
• Moves: The real-life actions of creative life
• Maps: The House of Creative Life Curation, representing 12 key themes of the approach
• Models: The Lifescope Model, the Thematic Curation Framework, and the Creative Identity Engagement Framework
• Methods: The Creative Life Curation method, which uses Maps and Models to reflect on Moves

Creative Workfield provides the cognitive terrain and model tools for Mental Moves and Strategic Moves. It transforms the abstract structure of Thematic Space Theory into an operable work field. Through Creative Workfield, the knowledge worker can see the landscape of their cognitive activities, track their moves, and use models to interpret what they see.

The concept of Map, in any specific case, has its own thematic map. The Knowledge Discovery Canvas is one; the House of Knowledge Discovery and the House of Project Engagement are others. These case-level maps are the subject of level 3.

2.3 Thematic Map: Visualizing Knowledge Models as Maps

Thematic Mapping, the name the Toolkit gave to this practice, is the method for making a thematic map from a knowledge framework and developing relevant mapping methods. Its premise is the one set out in 1.1: a framework is a combination of Thematic Spaces, so it can be drawn.

Once visualized, a knowledge framework becomes a map, which can in turn be used to represent an individual's activity progress — and it is through this visualized, activity-tracking use that Thematic Space also connects to Social Moves. In practice, I choose a framework or model, take each of its concepts as a Thematic Space, lay them out on a canvas so that the whole becomes visible as a map, and then trace moves on the map.

A sequence of moves is a Path, and a map is richer than a single fixed structure: it holds many Paths. The Knowledge Discovery Canvas carries four such Paths: Robert Kegan's Knowledge Enterprise (2023), the Mental Moves Knowledge Project (2023), a Strategic Map for the Strategic Life Narrative (2024), and the House of Discovery and the Social Landscape Framework (2024). The previous article reads them Episode by Episode, in Part 4 of The Relationfield of Knowledge Engagement.

Thematic Space Theory employs thematic and knowledge maps to explore creative cognition, social cognition, and strategic cognition. In October 2025, I introduced the term "Creative Cartography" to describe this kind of practice. I also classified it into four purposes:

• Mapping Situational Themes
• Mapping Strategic Moves
• Mapping Social Landscapes
• Mapping Strategic Aspects

Four Houses serve as mapping tools:

• The House of Knowledge Discovery: For mapping the journey from themes to concepts—how we develop understanding of specific topics (Knowledge dimension).
• The House of Creative Life Curation: For mapping the curation of life experiences into meaningful narratives—how we organize our creative biography (Context dimension).
• The House of Project Engagement: For mapping engagement with developmental projects—how we navigate social landscapes through activities (Activity dimension).
• The House of Creative Life Strategy: For mapping strategic agency across nine aspects—how mental platforms guide enterprise development (Function dimension).

Together, these four Houses provide a comprehensive toolkit for mapping the Curativity of Mind across its four dimensions. Each House corresponds to one dimension, yet they all interconnect—just as the four dimensions themselves form an integrated whole.

The Thematic Map makes it possible for knowledge workers to "see" their cognitive terrain. It provides a visual reference for Mental Moves and strategic development.

2.4 Weave-the-Strategy in Context

Weave-the-Strategy is one framework within the Weave-the-Mind toolkit. The Weave-the-Mind toolkit is a member of the Mental Platform sequence. Placing Weave-the-Strategy within this larger context clarifies what it is for and how it relates to the development of a Mental Platform.

The Weave-the-Mind framework arranges its sub-frameworks along a developmental path: Meaning → Insight → Concept → Strategy (Decision). This progression illustrates how meaning evolves into insight, how insight forms concepts, and how concepts eventually support strategic decisions — a continuous movement from understanding to action. The sub-frameworks are:

• Weave the Meaning
• Weave the Insight
• Weave the Concept
• Weave the Strategy
• Weave the Decision

Within this sequence, the "Strategy (Decision)" end corresponds to the Strategic Moves weave-point of Weave-the-Strategy. This is where the framework connects directly to the Mental Platform sequence: Strategic Moves, Strategic Frameworks, Mental Platform, and Strategic Curation form a related group of concepts. The development of a Mental Platform is not separate from strategy. A Mental Platform is a concept system that supports the development of a Creative Enterprise; when that concept system is connected to a concrete context, it becomes the platform on which strategic thought and action depend. Strategic Moves are the moves made on that platform; Strategic Frameworks are the frameworks built from those moves; Strategic Curation is the work of weaving the pieces into a meaningful whole. These four concepts belong together.

Weave-the-Mind considers two directions of Knowledge Engagement: for use by oneself, and for use by others. The distinction runs through the whole toolkit. A framework can be a Concept System for Work, serving as an internal tool for the creator; it can also be a Concept System as Work, producing external results for others to use. Mental Platform belongs to the first direction; Knowledge Frameworks belong to the second. Both directions are present in the same practice, often in the same project.

Strategic Moves and Strategic Curation must be understood in both directions at once. A strategic move is not only a move for the creator's own cognitive development; it is also a move that shapes what can be offered to others. Strategic Curation, likewise, operates on both sides: it curates the creator's own materials into a coherent whole, and it curates what is presented to the world. The Weave-the-Strategy framework holds both directions in view.

The Container Thinking Journey in Part 4 shows this dual direction in practice.

Part 3: Case Studies of Thematic Map

This part provides a panorama of the thematic maps I have made over the years. It is not a complete list, but a demonstration: each entry shows how a knowledge framework was turned into a thematic map, and how that map was then used to trace moves and form paths. The details of each case can be found in earlier book drafts and articles. What follows is a chronological overview: the map, the method, and the case name.

3.1 The Knowledge Discovery Canvas (2022)

• Map: The Knowledge Discovery Canvas (originally named Thematic Space Canvas)
• Method: Thematic Mapping
• Case: The Lifeway of Thematic Space (2022)

The Knowledge Discovery Canvas was created in January 2022 to understand the process of developing tacit knowledge. It defines four thematic areas and a set of thematic zones, offering a map for understanding how a theme transforms into a concept within various social contexts.

3.2 The House of Knowledge Discovery (2024)

• Map: The House of Knowledge Discovery
• Method: Thematic Mapping
• Case: Mapping Strategic Moves #11: The House of Knowledge Discovery and the Social Landscape Framework

The House of Knowledge Discovery is a thematic map inspired by the Knowledge Discovery Canvas and the Grasping the Concept Model. It traces a journey of transforming a theme into a concept. The area outside the large circle symbolizes objective public knowledge; the inner space reflects subjective personal knowledge.

3.3 The House of Project Engagement (2024)

• Map: The House of Project Engagement
• Method: Mapping Strategic Moves
• Case: Mapping Strategic Moves #6: The Journey of Engaging with Activity Theory

The House of Project Engagement is a thematic map and interactive tool designed to facilitate life narrative engagement. It is an application of the Project Engagement Approach (v3.1). The map is organized into 12 thematic rooms, each representing a distinct type of social landscape.

3.4 The House of Creative Life Curation (2024)

• Map: The House of Creative Life Curation
• Method: Thematic Mapping
• Case: SEE THE MOVE: The Strategic Life Narrative Practice #0 (Introduction)

Designed on August 5, 2024, the House of Creative Life Curation features 12 thematic rooms. Using this map as a foundation, I developed a typology of Strategic Life Narrative practices, resulting in 12 distinct types.

3.5 The House of Creative Life Strategy (2024)

• Map: The House of Creative Life Strategy
• Method: Thematic Mapping
• Case: Mapping Strategic Moves #9: Strategic Life Development, Anticipatory Activity System, and a New Map

The House of Creative Life Strategy was designed as a tool for strategic narrative and decision-making, from the perspective of the Anticipatory Activity System (AAS) framework. It includes nine thematic rooms, later referred to as the nine aspects of strategic agency.

3.6 The House of Ecological Practice (2024)

• Map: Container and Containee: The House of Ecological Practice
• Method: Thematic Mapping
• Case: Mapping Strategic Moves #15: The House of Ecological Practice

Created on October 2, 2024, the House of Ecological Practice introduces a set of primary theoretical concepts and four models. Six key concepts are listed, alongside four major models: the Basic model, the Field model, the Landscape model, and the World of Activity model.

3.7 The House of Slow Cognition (2025)

• Map: Creative Workfield: The House of Slow Cognition
• Method: Thematic Mapping
• Case: Creative Workfield: The House of Slow Cognition

Designed at the turn of 2025, the House of Slow Cognition is a meta-map. It places the key concepts of slow cognition on one map, in seven rooms: Aspects, Attachances, Approaches, Maps, Models, Methods and Meanings. It integrates the 5A Slow Cognition Model and the 5M method.

3.8 The House of Creative Life Strategy (2025)

• Map: The House of Creative Life Strategy (v3)
• Method: Thematic Mapping
• Case: The Journey of Strategic Life Theory (v1, 2025) and its Landscape

This updated version of the House of Creative Life Strategy curates related possible books and models together. The knowledge map features nine themes, five models, and nineteen possible books.

Part 4: A Case Study of Strategic Move

This part presents the Container Thinking Journey as a case study of Strategic Moves. The case comes from Wonder and Wander: Revealing the Evolving Knowledge Enterprise, the third book of the Knowledge Strategy trilogy completed in the first half of 2025. It shows how I moved across more than five years, what strategies were embodied in those moves, and what the final outcome — the Theory as Enterprise framework — looks like.

4.1 What the Case Is About

The Container Thinking Journey is the historical development of the Ecological Practice Approach, from 2019 to 2025. The Ecological Practice Approach revolves around three key concepts: Container, Containee, and Opportunity. I often refer to this framework as "Container Thinking" in informal contexts, which is why I use it to name this journey.

The case study was conducted for the Wonder and Wander project in 2025. In that project, I used "Creative Journey" as an analytical unit. Each case study focuses on a distinct theme, curating relevant key actions and projects into a meaningful whole. The Container Thinking Journey is one of eight such case studies.

The case traces how the Ecological Practice Approach grew from a by-product of writing Curativity into a theoretical enterprise with its own knowledge system, sub-theories, knowledge centers, and book drafts. It covers the first-wave, second-wave, and third-wave development of the approach, and concludes with the recognition of "Theory as Enterprise" as the underlying pattern.

For this article, the case is read from the perspective of Strategic Moves. It shows how a knowledge worker moves across thematic spaces and social landscapes, what strategies are embodied in those moves, and how a Mental Platform is built over time.

4.2 The Five Strategic Moves

The early phase of the Ecological Practice Approach did not follow a linear blueprint. It evolved through a series of opportunistic yet strategically consequential moves. Five moves illustrate how concepts, frameworks, and practices emerged in response to shifting creative contexts.

Move #1: Turning a By-Product into a Strategic Object

In the summer of 2019, I shifted from Curativity Theory to the Ecological Practice Approach. The Ecological Practice Approach emerged as a by-product of writing Curativity. After March 2019, I continued revising Curativity and developing the Ecological Practice Approach as a new project.

Move #2: Self-referential Strategy for Platform Orientation

In June 2020, I shifted from Curativity Theory to the Knowledge Curation Project. Curativity Theory was born in 2019. Later, I faced a challenge of applying it to a particular field. If we see a theory as a Platform, then this challenge refers to Platform Orientation. I chose Knowledge Curation as the primary application of Curativity Theory.

Move #3: Activity Theory as Role Model

In August 2020, I selected Activity Theory as the primary object of the first knowledge curation project. There were three reasons. First, I was familiar with Activity Theory. Second, Activity Theory doesn't refer to a single theoretical approach, but a family of related theoretical approaches. Third, I considered Activity Theory as a role model of the Ecological Practice Approach.

After reflecting on the historical development of Activity Theory, I realized that the path of the theoretical enterprise moved between three major different fields:

• 1920s — 1930s: A psychological approach
• 1980s — 2000s: Organizational Sociology
• 2000s — 2020s: An interdisciplinary philosophical framework

The strategic developmental plan of the Ecological Practice Approach was set to match Activity Theory’s developmental path. Initially, the primary source of the Ecological Practice Approach was Ecological Psychology, a psychological approach to Affordance (potential action opportunities). In 2018, I developed the early version of the Ecological Practice Approach to study Curation; later in 2019, it was anticipated to grow into an interdisciplinary philosophical framework. Since it can be applied to the field of Curation, it could be applied to other fields. Moreover, my ambitious goal was to develop it into a social theory, paralleling organizational sociology.

The diagram below represents the strategic decision-making by using the “THEORY — END — MEANS — PRACTICE” schema.

This strategic alignment not only informed the sequencing of theoretical innovations but also helped shape an internal benchmark — a model of what a long-term, socially relevant theory might become. By following the “THEORY — END — MEANS — PRACTICE” schema seen in Activity Theory, the Ecological Practice Approach positioned itself for multi-phase growth: from theory formation to practice-grounded transformation.

Move #4: Meta-knowledge as Strategic Object

From August to December 2021, I ran the D as Diagramming project. This move marked a shift toward exploring meta-knowledge as a new strategic object. Gradually, I became more involved in meta-knowledge projects, treating themes, concepts, diagrams, and frameworks as strategic objects of my creative journey.

Move #5: The Theory—Practice Gap as Opportunity

In March 2021, I completed the book draft Platform for Development. The following month, I shifted focus from theoretical development to empirical research, aiming to test the Ecological Practice Approach. For my first empirical project, I chose to study virtual whiteboards and other platform-based practices.

4.3 The Three-Level General Strategy

After reflecting on the Container Thinking Journey, I identified several strategic themes that constitute a general strategy. These themes are categorized using the Enter-Event-Exit Schema:

• Starting with a Genidentity (Enter)
• Ontological Invention (Event)
• Framework-first Development (Event)
• Grounding through Case Studies (Event)
• Objectification-Driven Subjectification (Exit)
• Dialogical Expansion (Exit)

These three sets of ideas form a meaningful whole: a three-level general strategy for knowledge engagement.

• Meta-framework: The "Enter—Event—Exit" Schema
• Predictive Model: The "HERO U" Framework
• Situational Model: The "Container Thinking" Strategic Themes

4.4 The Outcome: Theory as Enterprise

The Container Thinking Journey reveals a deeper pattern: Theory as Enterprise. The "Theory as Enterprise" theme refers to 1) Theory as Thematic Enterprise, treating Theory as a dynamic, collaborative, and developmental process; 2) Using the metaphor of Business Enterprise to understand the structural complexity of an evolving knowledge enterprise.

It Is the Development Outcome of the Knowledge Worker's Own Mental Platform

In Part 2.4, I noted that Weave-the-Mind considers two directions of Knowledge Engagement: for self-use and for other-use, and that the Mental Platform sequence belongs primarily to the first direction. Theory as Enterprise, as it appears in this case, is a self-use case of a special kind: it is self-referential.

The Self-referential Strategy was applied throughout the Container Thinking Journey. The core concepts of the Ecological Practice Approach were used to guide the development of the approach itself. The approach functions as a systematic framework for developing both theory and thematic enterprise. Its core concepts work together as an operating system for action-centered social ecology.

This is the precise sense in which Theory as Enterprise is the outcome of the knowledge worker's own Mental Platform development. It is not merely that concepts accumulated over time. It is that the theory was developed by applying its own concepts to itself. The Mental Platform and the theory it supports are the same thing, viewed from two angles.

It Is Designed According to Map-Model

Theory as Enterprise consists of two components:

• Map: a three-layer map that describes the structure of an evolving thematic enterprise, incorporating the Evolving Knowledge Enterprise model as one of the layers.
• Model: a four-level framework developed by drawing on core concepts from the Ecological Practice Approach, explaining the dynamic complexity of an evolving knowledge enterprise.

The Map: The Center Development Toolkit

The Map is a three-layer map that describes the structure of an evolving thematic enterprise, incorporating the Evolving Knowledge Enterprise model as one of the layers. It is called the Center Development Toolkit.

The three layers of the Center Development Toolkit correspond to the three layers of the Self-Life-Mind schema:

• Ontology (Philosophy | Self): Self as Center, Creative Life, Theory as Enterprise
• Realism (Sociology | Life): Knowledge Center, Key Functions, Operational Themes
• Hermeneutics (Psychology | Mind): Maps, Mental Models, Mindwave Development

The Map offers a structural model that represents significant aspects of Center Development. It incorporates the Evolving Knowledge Enterprise model as one of its layers.

The Model: The Wonder and Wander Framework

The Model is a four-level framework developed by adopting the core concepts of the Ecological Practice Approach. It explains the dynamic complexity of evolving knowledge enterprises.

• Meaning Control System: Corresponds to the Ontology layer. It manages the semantic coherence and value orientation of the theoretical enterprise. The term is inspired by Fararo and Skvoretz's "hierarchical meaning control system," in which higher levels constitute commitments that enable and constrain lower-level activities. For curating a thematic enterprise, I used meta-frameworks such as the "THEORY-END-MEANS-PRACTICE" schema, the "Enter-Event-Exit" Schema, the "Mental-Social-Material" Schema, and the Life Coordinate Framework.
• Operating System: Corresponds to the Realism layer. The six core concepts of the Ecological Practice Approach function as an operating system for action-centered social ecology: Affordance (environmental interface), Supportance (social networking), Attachance (execution), Projectivity (application), Curativity (strategic construction), and Genidentity (system kernel). Affordance and Supportance serve as the power supply; Attachance acts as the processor; Curativity functions as the organizer; Genidentity operates as the memory keeper.
• Application Programs: Corresponds to the Realism layer. This theoretical operating system can "run" various types of programs. Over the past years, the core concepts have been used to develop knowledge frameworks for specific domains — Strategy, Narrative, Curation, Support, and Design — covering key functions of Center Development. Each possible book offers specific frameworks, diagrams, and methods.
• Interactive Interface: Corresponds to the Hermeneutics layer. Thematic Space Theory functions as an interactive interface, providing dynamic tools and maps to navigate creative and cognitive landscapes.

The four-layer construction positions the Ecological Practice Approach as a systematic approach to concept-centered activity. It is a comprehensive and evolving thematic enterprise of developing a theory.

The separation between Theme, Map, and Model allows the "Theory as Enterprise" framework to remain open and developmental as a thematic enterprise. While I use the Ecological Practice Approach to build the four-level Model, others are welcome to adopt different theoretical approaches to construct alternative Models. The more frameworks added to the Model section, the richer the "Theory as Enterprise" thematic enterprise becomes.

Part 5: Thematic Space in Knowledge Strategy

The Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit (v1, 2026), developed in Part 2, connects Thematic Space with the Weave-the-Strategy Framework (v1, 2025) and, through it, places Thematic Space in a more appropriate position on the GO Theory platform.

As mentioned in Part 1, on that platform, Thematic Space plays a double role. In HLS, it is one of four regions of the social world, corresponding to the mechanism of Mental Moves. In Gejunction, Thematic Spaces is one of four aspects of the same social unit. Gejunction itself is the interface between HLS and the individual. The Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit is what makes this double role operational.

From the Knowledge Strategy perspective, the conclusion is direct: the Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit (v1, 2026) is the concrete operational tool for the Thematic Space aspect.

5.1 The Coordinate-Center-Gejunction Framework as a Developmental Structure

In 2026, the SDP project and GO Theory produced a new framework: the Coordinate-Center-Gejunction framework. This framework describes how subjectivity unfolds across three nested layers.

• Body(Self): Living Coordinate — the first way subjectivity becomes located. A Living Coordinate is born at the moment Flow is cut by Focus. It is a lived position, not yet a stable center.
• Life(Self): Creative Center — where subjectivity becomes organized. A Center emerges when a Living Coordinate is sustained through attention, action, and resources. Once it becomes a Center, Flow becomes Theme and Focus becomes Identity.
• History[Life(Self)]: Gejunction — where subjectivity becomes synthesized. A Gejunction is a structured grasp of one's overall standing in the social world, not a momentary situation but a broader structural position.

These three forms are not stages in a linear sequence. They are nested layers of the same unfolding. Every person exists in all three at every moment.

At the individual level, however, there are individual differences. For Knowledge Strategy, the question is how this ideal hypothesis becomes reality for a specific person. That process inevitably requires strategic thinking and action that go beyond conventional behavior. The toolkits described above are what make that possible.

5.2 A Complete Set of Toolkits for the Four Aspects of Gejunction

With the Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit (v1.0, 2026) in place, each of the four aspects of Gejunction now has a concrete, expandable model or toolkit:

• Living Coordinate → the FFCC model (Flow–Focus–Center–Circle), with Center at its core
• RelationField → the RelationField Framework, the Subject - Subject (Subject - Object) schema and related analytical models
• Weave-points → the Weave Knowledge System and the GO Square series of maps
• Thematic Spaces → the Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit (v1, 2026)

This fourfold completeness is what lays the foundation for the further development of Gejunction. Each aspect is no longer only a conceptual perspective; it has its own operational tools.

5.3 New Horizons for Knowledge Strategy

This connection gives Knowledge Engagement a new horizon. Knowledge Strategy is not just about making moves. It is about moving from a coordinate, through a center, to a Gejunction. The Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit provides the operational tools — Thematic Map, Creative Workfield, Strategic Agency — for this journey. The GO Theory platform provides the developmental structure.

The nested toolkit — from Weave-the-Strategy to the Coordinate-Center-Gejunction framework — provides a comprehensive framework for understanding Thematic Space in Knowledge Engagement. It shows how an abstract theoretical concept becomes an operable tool, and how that tool is used in real knowledge activities to develop strategy and achieve optimal results.

Just as RelationField uses the Subject-Subject (Subject - Object) model to open the social relation field, this article uses the Weave-the-Strategy model and Creative Workfield to open the cognitive thematic space. The two articles form a complementary pair, each illuminating one aspect of the Gejunction framework.

This is the Thematic Space of Knowledge Engagement: a concept that has evolved from an abstract theoretical concept to an operational concept, from an independent knowledge enterprise to a region of the social world to a perspective on the same social unit. Through this evolution, it provides the knowledge worker with a powerful tool for developing strategy and achieving optimal results in knowledge activities.

Postscript: Toward a Gejunction Analysis Method

On August 31, 2026, I edited a collection titled Gejunction in the Wild. That collection documented an unscripted encounter between a freshly proposed framework and a living situation. It was not a systematic application of a pre-defined method; it was a theorist using his own theoretical tools to understand his own situation, in real time. The collection's contribution was to demonstrate that the four aspects of Gejunction can be operationalized, that they cohere as a single unit, and that analyzing a living situation through them yields insights not available through any single lens. It did not deliver a method. It documented the emergence of one.

This Revisiting-and-Rebuilding of the Knowledge Strategy trilogy, which produced this series of articles, has taken that work a step further. Each article has packaged one aspect of Gejunction into a concrete, expandable toolkit:

• Thematic Spaces → the Weave-the-Strategy Toolkit (this article)
• Living Coordinates → the FFCC model (Flow–Focus–Center–Circle), with Center at its core
• RelationFields → the RelationField Framework and related analytical models
• Weave-points → the Weave Knowledge System and the GO Square series of maps

With these four toolkits in place, each aspect of Gejunction is no longer only a conceptual perspective. It has its own operational tools. Together, they provide a complete set of instruments for grasping a person's overall standing as a single, synthesized configuration.

This is what "Toward a Gejunction Analysis Method" requires. The August collection showed that the four aspects could be operationalized in an unscripted case. This Revisiting-and-Rebuilding of the Knowledge Strategy trilogy has now packaged the tools for each aspect. The next step is to use them together, systematically, across multiple cases. That work remains ahead. But the foundation has been laid.

v1.0 - September 29, 2026 - 7,993 words