Do you ever feel like you have some great ideas, but when you sit
down to write them, they’re not so great? Or even worse, you can’t
really get a sense of what the ideas were?
In one of my graduate student coaching groups we have been
discussing the difficulty of translating partly formed ideas into words
on paper. One technique that makes use of a normally underutilized part
of our brain is called “Mind Mapping.”
What is a Mind Map?
Tony Buzan, who created the word “Mind Map” and has written extensively on it, describes it as a powerful graphic technique that
makes use of the way our brains naturally work. He says it has four characteristics.
1. The main subject is crystallized in a central image
2. The main themes radiate from the central image as branches
3. Branches comprise a key image or key word printed on an associated line.
4. The branches form a connected nodal structure
How Do You Mind Map?
Mind mapping is best done in color. If you have some markers or colored pencils, and a sheet of white paper, you’re ready. If you don’t, just use what you have. Start with the central idea that you are trying to wrap your mind
around. It could be the big picture (e.g. your next chapter) or a smaller idea (e.g. the next few paragraphs.) Write it down in one or two words at the center of the paper, and draw a circle around it.  If there is a symbol or picture that you can put with the words, sketch that in. The idea is that you are activating the non-verbal side of your brain. The quality of what you draw is not important, since you will be the only one seeing it. The same is true for the ideas you come up with. Don’t edit, just put in what comes to mind. There are no rules for the way to proceed from here. I tend to break rules, anyway. The way my mind works, I start thinking of related ideas, categories, and ideas, which I write in little circles surrounding the circle in the middle. I then use lines to connect them. Tony Buzan likes to draw curved lines emanating from the center, and write the related or associated ideas on the lines. The result looks like a tree emanating from a central spot. My technique looks more like a bunch of lollipops. As you continue to add associated ideas to your outer circles or branches, you continue to draw the connections. You will notice as you fill them in that there are cross connections that appear. I find it helpful to draw lines between those interconnecting ideas.
How Does a Mind Map Help?
The brain is an associative network, and the right hemisphere (in most people) is responsible for non-verbal, visual, associative and much creative thinking. Normally when writing, we are mostly making use of our left hemisphere, which tends towards the analytical, one-thought-at-a-time approach. Our internal thoughts, however, are not shaped like that. Thus we have a roadblock as we try to get our brilliant thoughts on paper. By using a Mind Map as a starting point for thinking, you can bypass the blockage and feeling of overwhelm caused by overly analytical thinking. The Mind Map allows you to see more than one thought at a glance, and in doing so helps clarify your thinking. It shows the way ideas are interrelated (or less related than you thought.) It allows more access to creative, non-linear parts of our brain.
How Can Grad Students and Professors Use Mind Maps?
At this point, you’re probably thinking, “How is it that Gina writes so brilliantly and clearly? How does she keep all her creative thoughts straight?” The secret is that I use Mind Maps to write my articles. So it’s not a high IQ but my Mind Mapping skills that got me where I am today.  Here are some helpful ways to make use of Mind Mapping.

1. Use it for brainstorming ideas for your proposal or new research project.
2. Make a Mind Map of your next chapter or the one you’re currently stuck on.
3. When planning your career, make a Mind Map to show the pros and cons of your available options.
4. Use a Mind Map to take notes.
5. Mind Mapping can help keep you awake and interested in your subject.
6. Prepare for an upcoming meeting with a Mind Map and use it to explain your ideas.
7. Use it in teaching, both to prepare classes and for handouts.
Play around with Mind Mapping. You’ll find it’s a refreshing break from the one-foot-in-front-of-the-other way that we approach many things in life.

Do you ever suspect that you’re sitting in the driver’s seat of a high performance brain, but unfortunately it came without an owner’s manual?   You’re certainly not alone; most of us have the unshakable feeling that we are inherently capable of “much more” if only we could get our brains in gear! Folk wisdom has always alluded to how little of our brains we use, but until recent ground breaking scientific discoveries we had no way of really knowing.   The first neurologist to scientifically observe, “The brain indicates its powers are endless” was Australian Neurology Nobel Laureate Sir John Eccles. (Lecture: University of Colorado, July 31, 1974.)   Today Neuroscience has discovered more about the brain in the last decade than in all the years of previous human history combined, and the implications of the latest research are clear — the human brain is far more powerful, with the potential for immensely greater intelligence and higher achievement, than was ever before imagined.   British Pediatrics Professor, John Lorber, did autopsies on hydrocephalics, an illness that causes all but the 1/6th inch layer of brain tissue to be dissolved by acidic spinal fluid. He tested the IQ’s of patients before and during the disease and his findings showed that IQ remained constant up to death. Although over 90% of brain tissue was destroyed by the disease, it had no impact on what we consider to be normal intelligence.   Russian Neurosurgeon Alexandre Luria showed, by performing ablation experiments, that one third of our frontal lobes are dormant. His method was to give physiological and psychological tests prior to surgery, remove parts and whole frontal lobes, the re-test afterwards. His conclusion: removal of part or all of frontal lobes causes no major change in brain function, (however with some change in mood alteration). (Luria, A.R. “Frontal Lobes and the Regulation of Behavior.” Psychophysiology of the Frontal Lobes. 1973)   Finally, the human brain contains roughly 10 billion neurons, mostly in the outer layer of brain cortex. The function of these currently dominant brain-cells is fairly clear, but the brain also contains 120 billion glial cells. Aside from some secondary care and feeding of neurons, the primary function of the glia brain-cells is not clear. What miraculous discovery awaits mankind within these mysteries?   The wisdom of the persistent urban legend that says “we only use 10% our our brains, at best” has taken on an added dimension. John Eccles remarks on this saying he thinks that number is too high, after all “How can we calculate a percentage of infinity?”   The art and science of training our minds to tap into its greater potential is not new. Buddhism, for example, is an entire way of life based on the training of the mind. And in more modern times, mind training has become so widespead, that the same could be said for Olympic Athletes, or Professional Golfers, or Financial Market Traders, etc., where mind training is also an entire way of life.   However, given the inspiring advances in neuroscience, a vast shift in Mind Training has begun to happen, taking on new more personal dimensions and touching our lives in very direct and immediate ways. It is as though each new scientific discovery gives us our own personal key to unlocking our mind’s greater potential.   Personal mind training instruction abounds on every facet of personal development imaginable — health, wealth, happiness, relationships, physical fitness, income, sexual satisfaction, communication, just to name a few.   And sprinting in the lead is Professional Mind Training with its many diverse areas, such as:        Neurofeedback     Brain Hemisphere Syncronization     Bi-neural Stimulation     Autogenic Training     The Mozart Effect     Kinesiology     Brain Food     Neurolingistic Programming     Enriched Environment Neural Training     Biofeedback in all its numerous forms     Brainwave Entrainment in its many forms     and the list goes on and on!        Along with these types of technologically cutting edge mind training, ancient consciousness altering techniques are being retooled into such modern mind training modalities as Mind Altering Breathwork (Yoga), Vibrational Mind Medicine (Tibetan singing bowls), Sound Therapy (Mantras, Drum Beating, Chanting, etc). Even the more familiar, but still misunderstood, Self Hypnosis is experiencing a vast resurgance of popularity.   All of this is making mind training one of today’s most exciting and rapidly expanding fields. But the results it is generating in terms of ever and ever greater human achievements is even more astounding.   World sports records are now routinely being broken with each Olympic event. Sir Roger Bannister’s breaking of the 4 minute mile world record in 1954, a human threshold which was at the time believed to be impossible or at the very least ruinous to a runner’s health, is distant history now. Many runners have since beaten it and by the end of the century the one mile world record was 3:33.13 minutes. In a span of 93 years, 14 different athletes have been recognized as “the world’s fastest man” as world records fell one after another, but records fell lower after 1990 which is when coaching is acknowledged to have begun to include serious mind training.   Additionally, the more wide ranging records in the Guinness book of World Records are also now being broken with regularity. Even the book itself keeps breaking its own records, as the longest running best-selling copyrighted series of all-time!   Mind training has earned its stripes and as Victor Hugo said, “No army can withstand the power of an idea whose time has come.” Add to that John Eccles voice reminding us, “The brain indicates its powers are endless“, and the future of developing human potential — our personal greatness — has never looked more limitless!