Mind Mapping - Alternative Thinking - A Thousand Words is Not Worth One Picture

We have all heard the saying, "A picture is worth aWith Places We Love highlighted work that insert key,
thousand words." The sentence seems to conveyMaui, London, New York, San Francisco, Santa Monica,
some idea of equality. Mind mapping gives the like toany beach, and on and on. Highlight Maui - road to
that thought. A good mind mapping picture is worth farHana, north shore big wave surfers, whale watching,
more than a thousand words. The mind map itself willsurfing, Paia Fish Company, local musicians, the banyan
generate many more possibilities than a few pages oftree, Maui marathon, etc. In a minute or so we have
writing. It's easy to show how to generate a mind map.generated a couple of days of writing.
In less than a minute we can demonstrate theIf you become addicted to this process, you may find
technique and the many possible uses.yourself with a large diagram which might be
Having made this claim, let us write a description of theinteresting as a piece of art (especially if you have
beginning of the creation of our map, visualize theused a lot of colors!) but not too productive about
creation, and see how the methods compare.specific projects. One by one, highlight the items that
Open the mind mapping software or get a set ofreally appeal to you. Look at the icons in the upper tool
colored felt tip pens and lets begin. In the center webar. By clicking on a check mark, a heart, or a smiley
see a small rectangle with the words - 'New Map'. Notface you can make a visual notation of where you
very descriptive. Hit the return key and we get an editwant to concentrate for the next few days.
box. Type in the words Article Ideas. Now we haveProbably not a good idea to introduce negativity into
something to work with.the creative process but you may have come up with
Hit the insert key. Type in the old favorite, 10 Tips, andsome ideas that you just plan don't like, maybe even
hit return. This is already giving us ideas but lets stickhate them. Mark them with an X, a sad face, a thumbs
with the main subject. What other thoughts do wedown. Think about why you don't like them and use
have for articles we would like to write? How aboutthat to trigger some more good ideas. Certainly more
Places We Love? Hit the insert key. We just learnedproductive than a simple delete.
something from a mistake. 10 Tips was highlighted soWell, we have used half a thousand words and
Places was added as a child to this branch but wemaybe covered one twentieth of our picture. The
wanted it as a separate branch from the center.good news is that maybe all these words will convince
Highlight Article Ideas and insert again. Now enteryou to give mind mapping a try.
Places We Love.