One of the best things about mind maps is that they allow you to brainstorm. Brainstorming really is nothing more than sitting down in a relaxed fashion and trying to solve a problem or come up with ideas. You can do this in a group or on your own. If you are a student, you should read brainstorming for students.

Mind mapping allows you to jot down any ideas that come to mind, no matter how crazy or off the wall. Sometimes the wilder an idea is the better because they tend to spark new ideas and new concepts. So, when working with other, you want to provide encouragement no matter what types of ideas they come up with. Mind mapping will help you to jot down these ideas and the associations between those ideas. Even in a group, this allows you to brainstorm very quickly and very effectively.

When you are done brainstorming, you can go back and rework the ideas that you have come up with. It also allows you to come back and explore these ideas. When you do, you can reorganize the information so that it can be communicable to others or easily understood when you revisit it later. So, while you are brainstorming, don’t worry about getting everything organized at first. Just come up with as many ideas as you can and go back and organize them later. Here is an awesome technique to generate ideas.

brainstorming group

Mind maps allow you to more easily communicate your ideas to others. It also allows you to communicate better with yourself as well. When you have a hard time figuring out a problem, or when you feel overwhelmed, you can simply use a mind map to better break things apart and better understand them.

Since you are using simple words and phrases, you don’t have to come up with anything profound when you are using a mind map. This allows things to flow out of your mind more freely. It also allows you to chip away at the problem or break into an idea a little at a time. Just use whatever words or phrases come to mind, and you will naturally come up with new ideas. Mind mapping forces you to break down your thought processes and reorganize them in a way that makes sense. This helps you to better understand things. You more ideas related information you can read ten ways to use mind maps.

Think of an atom. Each one of the keywords, pictures, and ideas are the atoms that make up a molecule. As you add these ideas you are creating something bigger, and when you reorganize these atoms and molecules, you end up with completely new materials. The ‘molecule’ that you have created may be a small part of something much bigger, but the more you create, the more you’ll end up with. If you are bad with creating mind maps, you can learn how to create attractive mind maps.

If you use mind maps on a regular basis, you will soon discover that you are able to recall information more easily. This is especially true for the information that you have mapped out. Mind maps are broken down into basic information. So, essentially it is like being given candy in bite-sized chunks. Not only is it easy to take this information in, but by the way it is organized, you can understand the relationship between things at a glance. So, you have an overall understanding after reviewing a mind map for just a moment.

Mind mapping also allows you to better plan out tasks. Say, for example, that you wanted to plan out the chores for the members of your household. Your central topic would be ‘Household Chores’, the main topics would be the names of each of the family members that you have living in your house, and the subtopics would be a listing of every family member’s assigned chores. Do you see how effective that can be?

You could also plan out your week this way by making the central topic ‘What to do this week’ and the main topics each day of the week. The subtopic would be every task that you needed to accomplish. You could use this mind map as a template and simply readjust the information day by day or as you needed to. This would obviously be helpful because you would have everything planned out and you would be able to review this information at a glance.

men getting ideas

What about planning for more complex events such as a wedding? Mind mapping this out could really help you to communicate to others what their role is and what they are responsible for. If you are doing this by computer, this information could be passed along quickly and easily. You could sit with a piece of paper and plan everything out with friends and family, and recreate or reorganize the information by computer as many times as necessary.

Obviously, mind mapping helps you to organize your thoughts and ideas. That is why writers use them so often. As their ideas change or expand, these documents can easily be recreated and reorganized. When the entire story is mapped out this way before it is even written, you can ensure that all the events that you want are included and that they fall into the correct places in your book. This can be applied to any situation where plans, thoughts, and ideas need to be laid out in advance and are likely to change often.

As was touched upon in the previous lessons, mind maps can help you to learn how to learn. They also boost your creativity because the process of mind mapping invites ideas. One of the great things about mind maps is that it displays text but in a very graphic sort of way. In other words, even if there are no images within your mind map, you are getting a very visual representation of what is being outlined. Plus, by reorganizing your topics and subtopics you are able to make connections that you may have never imagined before.

Using a mind map also gets rid of distractions. This is because it provides you with a layout and structure of the information that you would not otherwise get. For example, if you were sitting around thinking of what you needed to pack for your trip, your line of thought might wane towards other things that you need to get done before you leave town. If you were making a mind map, you could throw this in as a thought to remember, but then continue on planning what you were going to pack. Do you see how this can help you to focus in better?

Even if you couldn’t draw a stick figure to save your life, you can still create a graphical representation of your content. This is wonderful because it allows people easy ways to share and review information visually, even if they cannot draw these images out themselves. This can be quite empowering. It can spark creativity which you didn’t even know that you have, it can allow you to communicate ideas better and faster, and it can allow you to review the information at a glance. Often times this will make the mind map seem more fun and creative, and therefore more effective.

Using a computerized mind map can be especially helpful if you are planning out a book. You can begin outlining it with the table of contents, and then add in tiers of information within each chapter. As you are doing so, you can also add in the illustrations, charts, and graphs in their proper places. This, of course, will allow you to view the layout of your book before you even begin writing.

When you are mind mapping, you will find that the mind map keeps your brain engaged from multiple angles. This is because it is not laid out in a linear fashion like an outline would be. When your brain is engaged like this, it puts you into a transient-like state. It is well-known that when a person is in this state, or in ‘the zone’ as it is often deemed, this removes mental blocks and both sides of the brain are allowed to work. So, this allows for communication between both sides of the brain which would not normally occur. This also allows the brain to become more creative and more receptive to ideas.

brainstorming photo

Mind maps are very cool because they allow for, and encourage, both organized and creative thought. The mixture of numbers, text, and images that you can use to express your ideas are unending. Plus, they open your mind up in a way that allows better ideas and concepts to flow in a better way than you would get by any other means. So, when you work on your mind maps, try to become relax, yet engaged so that you are able to come up with the best ideas and solutions possible.