I woke up in the middle of the night, tossing and turning fitfully. Unable to completely fall back asleep, I let my mind drift to the product of the day (POD). What what be a nice counter-balance to yesterday’s legal form? My addled mind reached back to 2006, when I had started to make an origami fortune teller AKA “cootie catcher” template filled with wisdom. I never got around to releasing it, because I couldn’t think of eight good fortunes that tied-in with the productivity forms. Eight fortunes? It so happens that I now have eight separate operating principle cards from Day 9!!!

One happy design fact about cootie catchers: all the graphics can be printed on one side! Pretty cool, right?

Folding It

Here’s what it looks like once you print, trim, and fold it.

NOTE: When trimming, make sure you cut THROUGH the color bleed along the dotted line, not around it.

Using It

The “fortune-telling” are prompts related to being creatively self-reliant. I used the principles I follow when I need to be unafraid when moving through uncertain territory. To invoke them with the cootie catcher, follow these 3 steps:

1. The outside displays my 4 critical process words: EXPLORE – LEARN – BUILD – SHARE. Pick a word that appeals to you and do the open/close motion for the number of letters in the word. For example, LEARN has five letters, so do the open/close motion for 5 times.

2. Now, look inside and pick a number! Do the open-close motion for that amount.

3. You can pick whatever word grabs you the most. Lift up the flap to read your creative self-reliant reminder. Try to tie-it-back to the first word you picked, and SHAZAAM! The mystic powers of creativity wash over you!

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The “fortunes” are based on my “creative operating principles” mentioned earlier, which I’ve been collecting over the years as I come across the ones that ring true to me. Your experience may vary; I’d love to hear about it if you’re so inclined to share.

Download

You know you want this!

» Download The Creative Cootie Catcher PDF

If you need some more help, this YouTube video shows you how to do the folds. Or for the authentic tween experience, let your new best friend “Chelsea” show you how it’s done. She’s awesome! I know, right?

Adobe Acrobat Reader is recommended for printing. The built-in "Mac OS X Preview" and "Chrome Browser" PDF viewers do not always draw dotted lines correctly.

Enjoy!