How to Mindmap Like a Genius: Top Tips

There’s one learning technique that’s improved my processing abilities, and it also happens to be one of the most studied, yet most people only have a shallow understanding of how to implement it.

What is it?

Mindmaps.

The epidemiology of the ‘mindmap’ started with Tony Buzan, who was the first person to coin the term in his 1974 BBC series, and his book The Mindmap Book: How To Use Radiant Thinking To Maximize Your Brain’s Untapped Potential, by which he envisions a specific type of mindmap that follows Tony’s 10 Rules:

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Although, since their inception in 1974 (and even before), different ‘mindmaps’ have been invented (each with their own rules).

Including:
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• Greek philosopher Porphyry’s tree-like maps
• Leonardo Davinci’s Visual Note-taking Style
• Darwin’s tree diagrams
• Novaks Concept Maps
• Tree Diagrams (formal)
• Fish Diagrams
• Visual Diagrams
• GRINDE Maps​

And more…

Mindmaps can be taken to mean any set of nodes and links (implicit or explicit) that paint a picture of a specific topic, set of topics, or questions.​

As learners, mind maps are powerful due to their multifaceted benefits:​

• For understanding, they help you build your knowledge network in a way that aligns with what the mind of an expert looks like (ACT-R Theory)​
• For creativity, radial thinking takes advantage of the spreading activation effect, which helps us come up with new ideas more easily.​
• For memory, they leverage visual and spatial organization to enhance recall.​

Realizing this, the top 1% of learners take mindmaps to a different level.​

Seriously, there are SO many things you could do with mindmaps- I could sit here and write for hundreds of hours on it, but I won’t, instead I’ll give you 5 of my top tips for using & implementing mindmaps most effectively.​

1. A Tale of Two Pottery Classes

A famous study with pottery students found that between two groups with different objectives, one to create as many pots as possible, the other to create the perfect pot, the former ended up making more pots and better quality pots than the latter.​

This idea that volume is often a pre-requisite for quality is also exemplified in technical learning techniques like mindmaps or self-explanations, where the quantity of mindmaps & self-explanations is what’s relevant, and the more you create, the more you learn.​

This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t think about the mindmap you’re creating; rather, it means that you shouldn’t obsess over making the perfect mindmap, and instead, spend your energy thinking about all the different ways you can make it.​

2. Primary & Secondary Mindmaps

Primary mind maps provide a general overview of the subject, while secondary mind maps act as a supporting structure that paints a picture of specific questions or topics that help us understand the whole.​

In medicine, you might have a mindmap that outlines the specific process from (Symptom → Cause → Diagnosis); this would be a primary mind-map because it’s the one you would use most often when dealing with patients (and it outlines the typical thoughtprocess you’ll have in such a scenario); on the other hand, for a secondary mindmap you might break things down into (Disease X vs Disease Y), comparing similiar conditions (e.g., Parkinson’s vs Essential Tumors) to sharpen differential diagnosis skill; which, although more specific, still gives you unique insights into medicine.​

Top 1% learners are aware of this, and make sure they’re mindmap sessions balance both in moderation for optimal learning gains.
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3. The Connectivity Hypothesis

A major benefit of mind maps is that they facilitate connections, which is one of the essential elements of deep learning. As learners, we want to take advantage of this by highlighting as many connections between concepts as possible without creating a jumbled mess.​

This is also why drawing multiple mind maps is useful, because you get to make more connections than you otherwise would if you’d stayed faithful to one (a.k.a it’s ok to cheat on your primary mind maps, no repercussions, I promise)

That being said, making connections is just one part of the equation; you also have to prioritize the most meaningful connections on your mindmap, through emphasis, this way your mind gets the hint: “Ooh this is more important than that”, and organizes superfluous details around the most important concepts instead of vice versa.​

4. The Mindmap Criteria

To learn how to mindmap, you need to learn how to evaluate your mind maps as you go and learn new topics (that’s how you improve).
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This is a form of metacognition (an essential pillar of any learning system), and there are three dimensions that we can evaluate our mind maps on:​

• Distinctiveness → How unique is each node & link?
• Connectivity → How interconnected is our mindmap?
• Clarity → How clear is our mindmap?
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When combined, these factors lead to better memory, understanding, and organization of knowledge- all essential elements of becoming an expert.​

5. The Three Phases of Mind-Map Implementation (Novice, Intermediate, Advanced)​

There are three phases to any ‘Mind-Mapper’, and you can use them to track your progress on this specific technique.
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• Novice: Wing’s it (no-strategy)​
• Intermediate: Applies specific mind-map techniques strictly (applies known strategies)​
• Advanced: Knows how to adapt their mindmaps to their current learning goals (creates their own strategy)
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It’s fairly simple to transition from novice to intermediate (just follow the rules), but it’s an entirely different game going from intermediate to advanced; this next stage requires trial and error, distinguishing signal from noise, and having a deep understanding of mind-maps and the types of mind-maps that exist.
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Although time-consuming, mastering mind-maps is one of the highest leverage moves you can make as a learner- it’s totally worth it.
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