Map Your Mind

“You know that fantastic feeling you get after a great brainstorm? How do you get that on your own? How do your best personal brainstorm?” David Kelley, founder of IDEO and the Stanford d.school, gave me a lesson in pushing my own thinking. “Do a mind map. They’re the key to my creative success.” 

“Making a list is cliched. A mind map is how you get into your brain and push it to the outer limits, to places you haven’t been before. I make a mind map of everything: when I started the d.school, I made a mind map; when envisioning our latest strategic shift, I made a mind map.” 

I have to admit, I’d never created a single mind map prior to this conversation. Remember, I’m a recovering MBA, at times still somewhat unaccustomed to this strange world of design, even a dozen years into the adventure. But I’ve been practicing the tool myself, and have found it unlocks something special.

So how do you do it? I’ve tried to follow David’s prescription as closely as possible:

1 - “get a big piece of paper” - this is really important, actually. On my first attempt, I disregarded this step and used my pocket notebook. Big mistake. The real estate constrains your thinking enormously; or to say it differently, ample space gives one a sense of possibility and exploration, even permission to explore. With a small page, every idea has to be responsible.

2 - “in the center, write down your question, goal, or ‘how might we…’ statement” - “How do you know what to put in the middle?” I asked. “Everything. Anytime I’m trying to come up with ideas, I use it. The only catch is, it has to be important to you. It can’t just be an exercise.” I’ve found this to be important as well. Frivolous prompt, uninspired exploration.

3 - “write down the things you already know and think about the topic. There’s no news there. It might be news for other people, but not for you. This is the first ring of the map.”

These initial steps are not the main event, but merely preparation for the main thing. “The main way you generate progress is by branching out from the center, like the branches on the tree… The main feeling should be the center question (growing) branches extending out from it.”

So how do you get the map to grow?

4 - “starting with one node, ask, ‘What does this make me think of?’ or ‘Why?’ This is the next branch. Some things don’t make you think of anything, and they just die off. It’s stream of consciousness.”

5 - “keep forcing yourself to be inspired by the last thing to write the next thing. You know how if you’ve got to give a speech, you have canned stories or ideas that come to mind? Your goal should be to push yourself at least two branchings beyond your ‘canned speech’ level of knowledge. Stoke your drive to come up with what’s next.”

6 - “connect the same or similar ideas with a dotted line” - I have been surprised to see themes emerge across radically different “nodes” of my life as I’ve mind-mapped some problems I’m trying to solve.

7 - “put a box around insights or good ideas” - I’ve started color-coding, or even using different shapes to draw my eye to the interesting stuff.

When I asked David about how to know when a mind map is needed, he again emphasized, whenever you want to explore something that matters, and develop your thinking about it. “I do a couple a week. This isn’t as powerful of a tool for teams, but we still have to have interesting thoughts on our own, to bring to teams. This is how I pull them out.” 

His last admonition: “I’ve found mind mapping is not for everyone. It helps me come up with better ideas by myself. And probably one out of five people, it unlocks them in a special way, too.”

Perhaps you, like me, might be one of the lucky ones who are unlocked by this powerful tool.

Many thanks to David Kelley for his patience with me as a young padawan.

Related: Be Irresponsible

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