Mind Mapping Technique

You'll need some large sheets of paper and some colour pens (or you could use mind-mapping software programs). In the centre of your paper, you write down your starting thought, key idea or creative challenge. Now, you have a choice you can either systematically explore sub-ideas or you can just let your mind free flow and use your mind map to keep track of the ideas as they pop into your head. You can do both at different times.

The systematic approach to mind mapping involves creating branches out from your central idea, labelled with sub-ideas that relate to the central idea. So if you were mind mapping on the subject of, say, facials... your central circle would say Facials, then you would branch off with sub-ideas such as Skin types, Cleansing, Massage Techniques, Equipment, Tools, Products, Therapeutic Concept ideas, Facial Approach/Procedure, Marketing etc. This systematic approach can often end up being simply a way of creating a map of your knowledge of a subject -- but just seeing it in this format frees your mind to think creatively, laterally, dynamically on the subject. You start with your central idea on the mind map and you see what comes to mind next and you add that to the map with a branch line from the central idea to the new idea with a circle around the new idea. If that idea sparks other thoughts, you add lines and circles from the new idea to note down the other thoughts too. If you reach a dead end, you may go back to the central idea or to any other sub-idea that has occurred to you. While Tony Buzan encourages the use of colour pens and little drawings as well as words on the mind map, you'll find which approach works best for you. Mind mapping is an extremely adaptable and useful tool for creative thinking.

Tony Buzan, inventor of Mind Maps: http://www.buzan.com.au/

Deliberate Thinking

The quality of our lives is directly influenced by the quality of our thinking. If we spend most of our time fretting about the future or regretting the past, it will be nearly impossible to enjoy the present. On the other hand, if we fill our minds with positive thoughts and really work at savoring life as it unfolds, we will undoubtedly have a much happier and more satisfying life. And, because our mind is truly where we live, it is important to be deliberate about how and what we think. Deliberate thinking means looking around to see how an opportunity can be created. It is worthwhile to set aside time to deliberately pursue creative breakthrough. Visualisation can be enhanced with practice until it is rich and vivid like an inner movie. Words are useful but clunky when it comes to making creative breakthroughs. The old Chinese saying, “A picture is worth a thousand words" is so fitting to the subject of creative thinking. Pictures are shorthand for entire experiences that would take hundreds of thousands of words to describe. By thinking in pictures you can "travel" further and faster in your creative imaginings and your thinking can leap Universes. Deliberate thinking in pictures involves setting up a scene or thought experiment in your head and seeing how it runs.