What is Mind Mapping?

Mind mapping is a visual information management tool that helps us structure, organize, memorize, arrange, brainstorm and learn information in a highly specialized way.  These days though, mind mapping isn’t just about creating a map. It’s instead evolving into a visual information management tool that’s transforming the way we think, work, and develop our visual thinking capacity.

A Broader Definition of Mind Mapping

Mind mapping is a method for storing, organizing, prioritizing, learning, reviewing and memorizing information.  It presents an overview and summary of a body of knowledge that fuses words and pictures together.

Mind mapping seamlessly blends logic and creative thought to help us think more proficiently and effectively about the subject we are learning.

Mind mapping…

• Helps you grasp a big picture overview of the subject under study.

• Improves your capacity to explore detailed snippets of information.

• Helps improve your memory, retention, and comprehension of information.

• Helps you organize information into easy to remember chunks.

• Helps reduce mental clutter, cope with information overload, and overwhelm.

• Stimulates the imagination and encourages creative insights and ideas.

• Helps enhance your level of focus and concentration while working or studying.

• Helps expand your ability to take effective, better organized, and more comprehensive notes.

• Makes learning and organizing information fun and exciting, which subsequently strengthens your interest in the subject matter.

• Helps accelerate your ability to solve complex problems.

• Improved your capacity to manage your academic workload.

• Helps unlock hidden understandings within information chunks.

• Helps unlock unexpected creative insights and ideas.

• Helps you save time while working, studying or learning.

• Helps you to prepare for tests and examinations.

• Helps provide you with more clarity about your goals, ideas, and actions.

• Helps triggers creative associations between seemingly unrelated bits of information.

This list of benefits is, of course, by no means comprehensive. There are many more value-added benefits that are specific to individuals who consistently work with mind maps.

How to draw a mind map?

A mind map is a simple hierarchical radial diagram. In other words, you organize your thoughts around a central idea. We are focusing on the basics for now: mind mapping using pen and paper.

The objective of a mind map is to clearly visualize all your thoughts and ideas before your eyes. Don’t complicate a mind map with too many colors or distractions. Use different colors only when they serve a purpose. Always keep a mind map simple!

3 Simple Steps to Create a Mind Map

The three steps are:

• Set a central topic

• Add branches of related ideas

• Add sub-branches for more relevant ideas