BackMapping the mind
Sidin Vadukut on mind maps and how they work
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As I start this week’s column I can spot a peculiar diagram on my second monitor (I do most of my writing in front of two screens. Perhaps we shall touch upon this in a future column).
Every once in a while my eyes glance at this diagram that looks somewhat like one of those maps you see in in-flight magazines. With the airline’s headquarters marked with a large star, and long looping lines flying away to all the destinations the airline connects with.
The centre of this “network" on my second display is a circle with the words “Mind maps". And then lines radiate away from this central circle to secondary circles marked “Concept", “Purpose", “Benefits", “Tips" and “Pitfalls". Each of these nodes then generates its own little network of lines and nodes and dependencies. And so on.
This network of ideas and relationships is my own interpretation of a popular tool called a “mind map". There are many different ways of describing what a mind map is and, consequently, many different approaches to making one.
But the simplest definition is the Wikipedia one: “a diagram used to visually organize information".
At its most essential, mind maps are a tool to help you organize ideas, and the relationship between central and dependent ideas. This could be for the purpose of a lecture, an essay, a newspaper column, or even an office presentation. These are all popular uses for mind maps. But I also like to use them in classrooms and during interviews.
But what are they and how do they work? There are many types. But my own simple execution is as follows. Suppose I am making a mind map for this column. I write the theme in the centre: “Mind maps". Around this theme I write down all the concepts I would like to cover in this piece. Say, one of these is “Purpose". From the “Purpose" node I radiate out a set of new nodes, marked “School", “Office", “Home", “Miscellaneous" and so on. From “School", I then send out a new link to a node marked “Lecture".
In this fashion, I build an entire network of secondary, tertiary and even deeper themes all radiating from my central concept.
The next part is one reason why mind maps are so good: cross-linking. So I may create a cross-link between the “Lecture" node and another node marked “Research results", which falls under another section headed by “Benefits" (studies have shown that mind maps are better for some students than traditional note-taking). By doing this carefully, you will eventually end up with a fairly comprehensive network of ideas and concepts and connections around the theme of mind maps. Of course, I may not be able to use all of them in this column. But it ensures that I can see a compact network, and don’t miss out on anything key.
This is a bog-standard, plain-vanilla approach to mind mapping. There are many, many more structured ones. But even with such a basic execution, I find mind maps to be an indispensable tool in my daily life. I’ve used them for plotting books, articles, podcast scripts and, most importantly, for recording lectures, interviews and meetings.
I am particularly excited about that last use case. This is because most people speak not linearly but in loops. Teachers and interviewees often move back and forth between concepts. And recording everything down in a linear series of notes can be quite messy. Use a mind map on the other hand and you can instantly link ideas that were mentioned 40 minutes apart in the talk, without frantically flipping pages back and forth. Step back later and you suddenly notice that some nodes are more important than others. Bingo! Things to focus on.
Over the years, I’ve even used mind maps to plan family functions (yay) and shopping lists (yuck). Once you develop your personal method, and get the hang of doing them on paper or on a computer—I use a free app called FreeMind on the Mac—they quickly become second nature. Suddenly you’ll find yourself recalling entire meetings after a single glance at a single sheet of notepaper. Simple. No more taking reams of notes that are instantly forgotten.
Feel free to browse the Web for more on mind mapping (though watch out for the pseudo-science about cognition and brain functioning et al). My advice is to start simple.
The next column will tell you how to ditch your laptop for a tablet on your next trip. Yes, it can be done.
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