Mind Mapping For Dummies

Step 2: Entering your own thoughts

In Chapter 7, I introduced the technique of ‘just writing it out’. This means that you interpolate your own associations and thoughts about what you hear or read into your notes, just as you would in a conversation with the author or speaker.

When you read or hear something, it’s rarely the case that you know nothing whatsoever about the subject and it’s all new to you. On the contrary, at school and university you constantly connect content with material you’re already familiar with. It’s usually the case that, when listening or reading, a whole host of ideas and associations with similar and different content comes to mind. It’s essential to add these thoughts to your Mind Maps.

This has a number of benefits:

In this way you create other ways of processing content.

You broaden the context with your own comments.

I find it particularly fascinating to return to my thoughts and reread and extend them when revising (see Step 3).