Imagine you have four magic hats. Each one changes how your brain looks at a problem — same problem, different hat, totally different view.
You don't wear all four at once. You pick one, ask your question, see what comes back — then maybe try a different hat and see how the answer changes.
The Finder Hat
"What do we actually know?"
Like being a detective. You put this on when you just want the facts: what's true, what's out there, what have smart people already figured out.
The Framer Hat
"Wait — am I even asking the right question?"
This one's sneaky. It doesn't answer anything — it makes you notice the assumptions hiding inside your question, like flipping a picture around to see the frame.
The Fixer Hat
"Okay, let's build something."
The handyman hat. You've got a problem, and you want a plan — steps you can actually do today.
The Flyer Hat
"What if...?"
The dreamer hat. No rules, no "practical" — just the wildest, most imaginative way to think about this.
Each hat has three depths
You don't just pick a hat — you also pick how far you want to go. Every hat comes in three strengths:
Simple
The shallow end. A beginner-friendly question that gets you a plain, clear answer with no assumed background.
Deeper
You wade in further. This asks for more nuance, more angles, maybe some tension or complexity the simple version skipped.
Doorway
This one cracks something open. It's the prompt most likely to surprise you or lead somewhere you didn't expect.
So really it's a grid — four hats, three depths each, twelve prompts total:
| Simple | Deeper | Doorway | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 🟡 Find | "Just the facts" | "Show me the nuance" | "Surprise me with a pattern" |
| 🔵 Frame | "What am I assuming?" | "Walk me through the hidden tension" | "Show me three totally different lenses" |
| 🔴 Fix | "Give me a simple plan" | "Break the problem into parts" | "Rebuild this from scratch" |
| 🟢 Fly | "Give me 10 fun ideas" | "Write me something moving" | "Invent a wild metaphor" |
You don't have to know which one you want before you start. If Simple feels too thin, nudge to Deeper. If Deeper feels safe, nudge to Doorway. Same hat, same topic — just turning up the dial.
Same question, four hats
Here's what happens when you ask "What should I do with my time?" under each hat:
Pulls up research on how people spend their time well, with real studies and examples.
Asks you back: "Whose definition of 'well spent' are you even using?"
Builds you a simple weekly rhythm you could start following tomorrow.
Writes a letter from your future self, ten years from now, about what actually mattered.
The trick isn't picking the "right" hat. It's noticing that the same question can open four completely different conversations — and that's often more useful than any single answer.