You might remember at the start of the year, I showed you how to use a mind map to set your single achievable goal for 2010. Well now that it's April, I thought it might be a good idea to review my own progress in the pursuit of my goal for 2010.

Well after a couple of good months in which I eventually hit my milestones for January and February, I was on my first steps to achieving my goal for 2010.

Come March, I hit a brick wall, and never actually achieved the milestone I set for this month. Not to be down trodden though I pushed on through to April where I have achieved my milestone for this month earlier than I had expected.

With all the scribbles and notes I have made on my 2010 mind map, I am going to go back and redo again without all the scribbles. This should give me time to review on my previous milestone wins and prepare myself for the next 4 months ahead.

The great thing about mind mapping my goal for 2010 is that I have one portable mind map that goes with me everywhere I go and I can quickly add any ideas or thoughts to my mind map while I am on the move!

So last week we seen the first 5 rules for great mind maps. Here's a quick review:

1. Always use a central image
2. Add a background for extra punch
3. No sentences please
4. Keep your mind maps DRY
5. No branch lists

Let's not hang about and see what the next 5 are!

6. Use different colours

What do mind maps do? They convey information, but they do it in a visual way that linear notes can never do. A way to emphasize this is to use different colours in your mind map.

Colours not only convey if branches are grouped together or belong to one another, but they can also convey other things. Heat, cold, envy, anger, relaxation, stop and go are all things that can be conveyed using a colour.

Not only does colour help convey information, but it can set a mood for your mind map that makes it more interesting than a page of black and white text.

7. Use different fonts

Remember those whacky superimposed words from the 60's Batman TV series that appeared every time there was a fight scene? Right, I might be reaching back a bit, but it's a great example of how a change of font can convey something different. The same idea can be applied to your mind maps.

Using different fonts, you can convey emotions, emphasis and more.

Fonts are under-used in most mind maps I see. Users simply stick to the defaults supplied with their mind mapping software and don't do anything else. These defaults are sometimes only slight variations of the same font.

To make things easier, find out if your favourite mind mapping application allows you to setup your own fonts for each different level in your mind map. Experiment with different fonts and try a different font for each level of branches on your mind map.

8. Link it up

If there's one thing that software mind maps do well, it's interaction with the outside world. Today's mind mapping applications almost all have the ability to link to resources on the Internet.

The great thing about this is that you can provide reference material and background material to your mind maps using links to these types of material on the Internet.

Interacting with mind maps is a great way to get a user involved in your mind map, so don't forget to link up your mind map where and when you can!

9. Create a legend

If you're publishing a mind map for a wider audience then you need that audience to understand the mind map quickly and easily. To do this we make extensive use of colour, fonts and even map markers to convey our ideas and thoughts in a way that is easy for our audience to consume.

The problem we can face here is that not everyone's interpretation of a mind map is the same. The majority of people will agree on the message in the mind map, but there are some who still might end up missing the message in our mind map. Enter the legend!

Traditionally, legends are a way of describing the symbology of a map. Similar to maps, we use map markers in mind maps to add contextual information to our branches. If the map markers you are using in your mind map are open to interpretation, then why not add them to a legend with a short description of what each of the map marker means.

This will clarify the message in your mind map and allow for more people to consume your mind map in the way that you originally intended.

10. Group your thoughts with boundaries

Sometimes we need group ideas under a theme or topic. This is easy really, create a parent branch for the theme and add our ideas to the parent branch as sub-branches. What do you we do when we need to group ideas further though?

Boundaries are common feature now in mind mapping software. Quite simply they are a way of adding a border to a group of branches in our mind map. The great thing about boundaries is that they can indicate if a group of branches are important or need special attention.

So there you have it, my 10 rules for great mind maps is complete! Are there any additional rules you would add to the list that help you create great mind maps? Let us know in the comments below.

Happy mind mapping!

Mind mapping with software is such a great time saver over hand drawn mind maps, but sometimes we take things for granted and our software mind maps suffer due to a lack of input from our part.

In order to help you produce consistently great mind maps using your favorite mind mapping application, I've put together 10 simple rules that will steer you in the right direction.

1. Always use a central image

Mind mapping software makes lots of things easier than using paper mind maps, but probably none more than adding or changing your central image. Checking out the majority of public mind maps on the web, it's sad to see that many of them don't utilitise this feature in their mind maps more.

With a number of free image libraries and out there, it's hard not to see why more people aren't including a central image in their own mind maps. Even the Google Image and Flickr search allows you to search for images that are free to re-use and publish.

So have a scout about and see what you can find.

2. Add a background for extra punch!

How many mind maps do you see online that have a stark white background? Probably lots, but why not have something more interesting there in order to make your mind map pop out more?

Mind mapping software today has some great features, but one that is common amongst most of them is the ability to change the background. As I mention in my post about dimensions, texture can be an important aspect of your mind map and having a different background can really set your mind map apart.

Web designers have lots of free backgrounds that they share for other designers to use, so why not use these as backgrounds for your mind maps?

3. No sentences please!

Mind mapping laws state that each branch should only use keyword per branch. So why are seeing whole sentences and questions in mind maps?

With mind mapping software, the temptation is always there to simply keep on typing. Stop!

Just because you can do this doesn't mean you should. Instead start getting into the habit of using 1 or 2 keywords per branch. This will make your mind map better to recall and also stop it from spreading out too far horizontally.

4. Keep your mind maps DRY

Recently I seen a mind map of a meeting agenda on a public mind mapping site. In the central topic the author put the name, date and time of the meeting. Then in a separate branch they entered the same information. If you already have the meeting information, why duplicate it?

A popular acronym amongst programmers is DRY which means "Don't Repeat Yourself". This acronym encourages programmers to re-use existing code they have written in their software project so that they have less to maintain and test.

For mind mappers the same rules apply. Repeating yourself in your mind map is simply duplicating the same information over again. The downside to this is that you're using up space in your mind map that could be used for something another idea or thought. Space counts in any mind map you produce so it makes sense to re-use existing branches in your mind map.

To re-use branches, link similar branches with relationships to indicate that two branches are related on the same topic. Just about all mind mapping software lets you create relationships between branches, yet it is something that is sometimes over looked when creating a mind map.

5. No branch lists!

Ever seen a mind map where a branch contains more than 20 topics in a single level under a single branch? At this stage the alarm bells should be ringing. You're now creating a standard list which goes against the core idea of mind maps, radiant thinking.

As easy as it is to do this in mind mapping software, it's not something that should be encouraged. Mind maps are flexible yes, but when you create a branch like this, then your not utilising the full potential of mind maps and it's organic structure.

If you have a list such as this, then try and break it down further into smaller branches. Try grouping your list under different branches so that you never have more than 5 or so items on the same level under a single branch. Mind mapping is all about radiant thinking and to aid our thought process we need to maintain an organic structure in our mind map. Smaller groups of branches are also easier to consume and manage than a big list.

Well that's it for the first part of my 10 rules for great mind maps. Next week we'll look at my last 5 rules for great mind maps. In the meantime, happy mind mapping!

I've been using a weekly capture mind map on and off for few years now, but recently I wanted to timeline my mind map in a way so that I could see a single days input without losing my preferred set of basic ordering ideas.

I happened to chance on this a couple of weeks ago and so far I have found it a very useful technique. Let's have a look at how you can timeline your weekly capture mind map also.

Prepare Your Mind Map In Advance

On the first day of the week or the day before your work week starts, create the template of your weekly capture mind map with your central image and your basic ordering ideas. My preferred basic ordering ideas are:

1. Goals
2. Actions
3. Calls
4. Notes

Feel free to use different colours and styles for each of your own basic ordering ideas, in order to differentiate them. This is the starting point for your weekly capture mind map. As I already have my week ahead planned, I also enter any goals I hope to achieve for that week.

Different Day, Different Colour

Designate each day of the week with a single colour. With that one colour I update my mind as the day goes on. Ideas, calls, next actions and notes all get added or amended to my capture mind map using that one colour. By the end of the week, have a mind map that quickly shows by colour how active I have been on each day.

As you can see from this example, I have also included a legend with this mind map to indicate which coloured branch is associated with each day.

Using a timeline with my mind map has enabled me to measure progress and activity on a daily and weekly basis which makes my end of week review a whole lot easier.

Not only can I also use the mind map to review my own progress but it also acts as a central point where my other notes and ideas can be recorded. At the end of the week I can then process these ideas and notes into their respective folders.

Happy mind mapping!

So a couple of weeks ago I wrote about my most common mind mapping mistake. For years I have been using lowercase keywords in my mind maps which made them hard to read later on.

Well, a couple of weeks later and after producing 10 mind maps, I think I have finally broke my bad habit of lowercase keywords. Here's how I done it.

I always carry a notebook for ideas, sketches, and other things that I don't want to forget. After trying out a couple of different sizes, I finally settled on the plain pocket journals by Moleskine. Their cheap and really portable. This was my secret weapon for breaking my bad mind mapping habits.

For my bad keyword habit, I created a sketch of a single branch with the habit I wanted to change and added a couple of branches that I thought were important to my habit and emphasized my habit.

Right, it doesn't look much but before I started each mind map, I opened my notebook at the this page and just reviewed the branch for a few seconds. Just a few seconds is all it takes. Now with the good habit still in my head, I started to create my mind maps using my new habit.

I reviewed this page before each mind map for a week. After a week I found myself turning to my notebook less and less and instead starting to mind map with uppercase keywords right away. For the last week I have been creating mind maps with uppercase keywords for all my mind maps without my notebook.

I plan on trying this technique for the year to help me with my mind mapping habits and I hope you try it too! It's not only a great way of breaking your bad mind mapping habits, but other habits too!

Happy mind mapping!

On the Systems Wiki blog, I read an interesting article regarding a new contextual analysis feature in the online mind mapping service, Comapping. What this feature does is analyze an attached document or URL and creates new branches in your mind map using keywords extracted from the document or URL.

This is an extremely helpful feature for information gathering, but I can't help wonder on the dangers of allowing technology to make these decisions for you, and especially when it comes to a thought process like mind mapping.

Everyday Decision Making

Everyday we allow technology to make decisions for us and influence our decisions. Probably the biggest decision maker today is the search engine. From millions of articles and references on the Internet it decides which results would be the best fit for the query you have entered.

This is okay for things that are clearly impossible for a single human to do, but when it comes to analysing a document or website then use these forms of automation with caution. For example, you don't always assume that the first post returned from a search engine is the best fit do you? Of course not!

Mind Mapping is Your Thought Process

You see, mind mapping is a process of getting information from one place to another. Part of this process is deciding on which information is important to you and should be included in your mind map.

As a long time mind mapper, I have taken a number of different sources of material and mind mapped the information that was important to me. Each time I did this, I made decisions that would be of benefit to me. Some of these decisions were made based on emotion or irrational thoughts. Can a machine make such decisions? Of course not.

Always Review

Tools that automate processes for us are great when we tell them exactly what to do, but when those processes employ a form of decision making in your mind maps, take some time to do a review.

If your software application employs such automation and returns 5 keywords from a business proposal, don't automatically assume those are the right keywords.

Scan the document yourself, and compare the keywords you have extracted with the keywords your mind mapping software has extracted.

You'll more often than not, create similar lists, but there might just be an important piece of information that your mind mapping software has missed.

What do you think? Is the process of information gathering for your mind map something you would rather do, or are you quite happy to delegate this process to your mind mapping software? I would love to hear your thoughts on this!

When I'm mind mapping the most common mistake I make is writing my keywords down in lower case. I've been making this mistake for years and each time I start a mind map I end up with a quarter of the mind map with lower case keywords and the rest of the mind map in upper case.

You would think I would have overcome this by now, especially after mind mapping for over 15 years. Well I'm still making the same mistake today.

It's not a bad thing really, because although I am still making that mistake, I am also aware of it.

In the interest of developing my own style of mind mapping, I'm keen to make it a habit of using captials in my mind maps, but when you're against the clock for projects and you start a mind map to re-group yourself, your style goes out of the window.

If you mind map using software though, you're covered. Lots of mind mapping applications have preset styles that automatically captialize your keywords for you. Yes, I could switch to mind mapping using software, but I still prefer to use paper mind maps 

I think I have solution though, that I hope will change the way I mind map, but more of that later.

When you're mind mapping, what's your most common mistake?

Let us know your mind mapping mistakes in the comments below and go public. Nothing motivates you more than going public with a mistake so that you can rectify it.

A couple of weeks ago I talked about the types of mind maps that I am going to be focusing on for 2010. Since writing this I've have discovered a couple of revelations about my mind mapping.

Mind Mapping is Fun

Okay, it's might seem a silly reason to mind map, but if you're not happy doing something, then why do it?

When I first started mind mapping, it was always for fun. When mind mapping ideas, books or personal reviews, it was always fun and it was always for me. A couple of years ago I started using mind mapping to manage my software projects. What started out as a great idea quickly turned into a nightmare.

At the start of this year I made a decision. I'm going to stop using mind mapping to manage projects.

Since then I have been able to enjoy my mind mapping more, because I'm mind mapping the things I want to mind map. It's fun again!

Mind Map for Yourself First

My mind mapping is primarily for myself, but when I produce mind maps for public consumption, I start to wonder if my mind map is conveying the right information. That's when mistakes start to happen. Single keyword branches become 2 or 3 keyword branches, extra information is added, and lot's of other unnecessary information gets added to my mind map. This is not the way to do it.

In an effort to improve my writing in general I bought Stephen King's book, "On Writing". I've had heard so many good reviews about it that I decided I must give it a try. The one part of the book that really stood out for me was Stephen's comment concerning writing and drafts.

Basically the first draft you write is for yourself and the second draft is for anyone else who wishes to read your manuscript. We can apply this to mind mapping, but we don't usually prepare multiple drafts of a mind map. So how does it work for mind mapping then?

It's simple. Mind map for yourself, let others take from your mind map what they need.

Your mind map is based on your thinking, but you can't anticipate the thinking of each person that reads your mind map. If you stick to the guidelines of mind mapping then each person that reads your mind map will be able to take what they need from it.

The Reward

A rewarding mind map is one that you enjoy making. I've only just discovered that I don't enjoy mind mapping everything, but the topics that I like to mind map often result in being the most rewarding mind maps.

Review the way you use mind maps and find alternatives for those things you don't enjoy mind mapping. Instead focus on the things you enjoy mind mapping. It's much more fun and rewarding!

Happy mind mapping!

While tweeting about my weekly mind map, Niall Daly asked me on Twitter how I mind map my weekly review. Today I am going to show you!

Mind mapping your weekly review is a great way to reflect on the previous week and prepare yourself for the week ahead. The best part is it only takes a few minutes of your time.

I tend to split my weekly review mind map in half down the middle of the page:

1. The left half is where I reflect on the past week.
2. The right half is where I prepare for the week ahead.

I always start with reflecting on the previous week. It's give me an idea of areas or projects that I need to place more focus on. Before I start mind mapping my reflections, I create two branches on the left of my mind map called 'Hits' and 'Misses'.

Under the hits branch I add branches for roles in my life or projects that I am working on. Under each of these I add branches where I have performed well in. Using a single keyword to denote the area in each roles or project I have done well in, it gives me a good overview of where I have made progress.

Under the misses branch I add branches for roles and projects similar to my hits branch. Under this branch I mind map out aspects of each role or project that I have neglected.

I spend a couple of minutes reviewing my past week and start thinking about roles and projects that I want to focus on for the week ahead. Taking a couple of minutes to just reflect on your past week let's you identify roles or projects that you have neglected. Now we can start preparing for the week ahead!

On the right hand side of your mind map add a separate branch for each of the roles or projects that you are going to focus on for the week ahead. Under each role or project, mind map the next actions you need to complete in order to move that project forward. In no time, you'll have a list of next actions for the next week.

When you're mind mapping your weekly review, remember these tips:

1. Messy is good, the mind map gets thrown away in a few minutes anyway.
2. Stick to single keywords for branches. Using associations we want to generate ideas and actions for our projects and roles.

This is just my preferred way of mind mapping my weekly review. I also use a similar mind map to review activities at work. I like to keep my work and personal projects separate, but there's no reason why you can't use a single mind map for both.

I hope this helps you in your weekly reviews.

Happy mind mapping!

I've been using Google’s Gmail application for a few years now, but up until a few weeks ago I didn’t realise how much time I had been wasting. Since I had started using Gmail, I had been using the mouse to shuffle emails about. Not very productive when you consider that using the shortcut keys can be much faster than fiddling about with a mouse.

In an effort to spend less time in my inbox, I decided I would learn the shortcut keys so that I could process my emails faster.

So what was I going to use to remember all these shortcut keys? Mind mapping of course!

Mind mapping your short cuts keys is a simple process. Starting out with a list of shortcut keys, mind map each of the shortcut keys based on their context.

What’s great about this exercise is that the actions that you are mind mapping tend to be only 1 or 2 words long, so it’s really easy to organise your shortcuts into branches that mostly consist of 1 keyword. Also the actions you are mind mapping can be easily annotated with images that make your mind map stand out more.

Here's my mind map for Gmail's shortcut keys:

Tips

Trying to remember shortcut keys for your favourite applications is a marathon not a sprint. Remember these tips when you're learning your shortcut keys to make it easier:

1. Keep the mind map in view while your working. Having it nearby as a reference means you can quickly look up those shortcut keys you’re not familiar with.
2. Review the mind map each morning and identify those shortcut keys you haven’t memorized yet. Make a point of learning those for that day. Next day test yourself on the shortcuts you used the previous day and see if you remember them.
3. If your application has hundreds of shortcut keys, then try to learn only those shortcut keys that you will use on a day to day basis. I don't use the Tasks feature of Gmail so I left it out of my mind map.

I’m hoping to turn this into a habit in the next few weeks, by which point I won’t need the mind map as I will have committed everything to memory.

Being able to work smarter means learning more about the software you use on a daily basis. Each month I’m going to make a point of mind mapping a single application’s shortcut keys and start using them.

Happy mind mapping!