mind mapping
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What is mind mapping?
“Mind maps are an excellent way to visually represent the nonlinear and associative way we organize information in our minds.” ~ Jessie Guy-Ryan
AKA the most helpful and cathartic organizational tool for people obsessed with taking notes (me!). It’s also a great way to be more actively engaged with the things that are usually discarded into the ‘Useless Memories’ section of our brains as soon as we’re done experiencing them. Engaging more intentionally can then create space for new thoughts, ideas, growth and introspection. Win win!
My mind map is based off the stimulants and experiences I encountered over the course of a week. Any time I felt a shift in emotion or felt myself being intrigued in something beyond vague acknowledgement, I scribbled it down in my notes. And honestly, being in a pandemic and all, I went in to the week expecting there to be very few inputs that would be different from the general day-to-day constants of COVID life. But I was pleasantly surprised to find that I had something to jot down everyday. This was hands down my favorite part of the project — the realization that beneath the repetitiveness that time can impose on our memories, there actually are little events and actions occurring that we are constantly growing, learning and evolving in response to.
How to make a mind map?
Ideas: My process for this was pretty straightforward: write everything down. Anything I was actively engaged in went straight into my notes, didn’t matter how “insignificant.” Even Chris Harrison’s recent interview scandal went in there(he’s stepping down, holy shit!). Gorilla Glue Hair woman went down in there too. I really mean everything.
Organization: My favorite part! As I jotted things down, I noticed myself subconsciously categorizing inputs as either “stressful” or “sparking joy.” I was nervous about splitting it up in this way though — none of the example mind maps I’d come across during my research had done something similar, so did that mean I was doing it all wrong? But going against my instincts would completely defeat the purpose of the project to begin with — allowing your ideas to be directly influenced by your experiences.
Tool: I initially had the idea to go straight for Procreate — I knew I wanted to use my own handwriting for the project because I felt it would ring true to the personal nature of mind maps. A Procreate + Apple pen + iPad combo definitely seemed like easiest way to accomplish that. However, I have limited experience with Procreate and found myself struggling with the initial set up of the map. So I switched over to Photoshop to lay down the base layer:
Picking up from Procreate to pencil in the diagrams became much easier after that. So I wrapped up the diagrams, straightened my lines, dotted i’s and crossed t’s, readjusted font sizes, and finally the map looked!!! Flat. And Boring. It had accomplished my goal of organizing and presenting my thoughts but held no visual appeal.
This is where sketching came in handy. I am not an illustrator and likely won’t be working for Pixar anytime soon. But I felt inspired by the encouraging words of the week’s lesson: “Sketching is a great way to visually represent ideas or directions for a project quickly. You don’t need to be a particularly talented artist — the goal is to rapidly represent a variety of ideas and alternatives, not to perfectly capture what’s inside your head.”
Overall, I’m pretty pleased with the end result of this experiment. Keeping my fingers crossed that I can carry some of the mindfulness I practiced this week into my daily life.
