Some of us have difficulty wrapping our minds around the values, themes and archetypes extracted from the narrative fragments collected during anecdote circles with the Cognitive Edge methodology. Why? For what reason? What purpose do they serve?

It just occurred to me that an analogy with an term from complexity science might help. It has helped me

Attractors, or, particularly in complex adaptive systems, “strange attractors.” serve as magnets, drawing actions to themselves in dynamic systems. Furthermore in dissipative systems attractors can be transformed. Themes, values, and archetypes, then, can be thought of as attractors serving to pull narrative toward certain values, certain themes, certain archetypes. Identifying the values, themes and archetypes can provide a typography of a group’s culture.