The following resource will take you through the theory and process of mind mapping and then, with examples show how this technique can help in overcoming writer’s block.
THEORY OF MIND MAPPING
The first thing to remember is that mind mapping is easy, it’s not complicated and is really up to you how it works. It involves a kind of brainstorm of ideas onto paper, you just need to have no filter to what you write down.
The mind map is a powerful graphic technique which can be applied to many aspects of life, with mind mapping being able to harness the full range of the brains cortical skills, allowing ‘free thinking’. It allows the linking of ideas or concepts not previously considered to come to the fore.
There are many resources and publications and if you wish to read further, the key author in this arena is Tony Buzan.
Mind mapping is a transferable skill and has been used and documented for many areas of life such as:
- Memorising
- Idea generation
- Note taking
- Essay / lesson planning
- Any situation where free thinking would be beneficial
This is not a comprehensive list, and you may well find a new use for it. As an example when I worked as a research nurse I had a theory that mind mapping could be used in transcribing research interviews. I subsequently published two academic articles on the theory: (C Tattersall, et al (2007) Mind mapping as a tool in qualitative research. Nursing Times. 103:26) and (C Tattersall et al (2011) Mind mapping in qualitative research. Nursing Times, 01 May 2011, 107:18).
In relation to creative writing, mind mapping can be used in breaking writers block or in everyday writing such as in plot development or title creation.
HOW TO MIND MAP
If nothing else remember – IF YOU THINK IT, WRITE IT DOWN.
Traditionally a mind map starts life as a single blank sheet of paper. Most books or articles suggest A4 paper in landscape with different colour pens or pencils at the ready. A question, title, or central concept or image is then placed in the centre of the page.
Any ideas or associated words that come to mind are then written or drawn around the central concept with sub-headings or related themes branching off.
These branches can then be sub-divided or related to other branches.
Use circles, lines, different colours or highlighters to promote more important ideas to join associated ideas or concepts. Links are therefore made to similar concepts or words, possibly (usually) resulting in new ideas. You’ll be surprised how often new ideas are formed.
The use of colours is a theoretical way of allowing creativity to flourish, but there are no set rules with each user free to develop their own system or code of shapes, colours, lines or symbols allowing related ideas, concepts or themes to be linked or integrated with each other on both paper and in the users mind.
No self-editing is crucial, if it comes to mind, it gets onto the mind map. This can’t emphasised this enough. Below is an example mind map of how to mind map.
My personal technique has become rather pared down as I find that mind mapping quickly is advantageous to my free thinking, so to swap coloured pens or doodle too much is not conducive to an effective map, but that is only a personal preference and may be frowned upon by others in the mind mapping community. I use an A5 notepad and two pens – one nice ballpoint and a highlighter with its cap off, ready for use, but you will develop your own style.
There are also free apps to help, but again, personally, I have not been able to effectively use any as I find it slows the process to the point that my creativity is lost, but this may not be the case with you and they are worth experimenting with, at least the free ones.
The next example is based on a 154 character text based themed flash fiction competition which I won (‘txtlit’ now sadly obsolete). The theme for the story was ‘Payday’.
This first (faked) mind map is something like you would expect to see from a text book.
However, my real mind map is next, which, as mentioned is quicker and more simplified than what you will see in text books. Don’t be intimidated by how others may mind map, find your own system.
In a few minutes I had settled on a plot twist to the theme of ‘Payday’ by looking at the disappointment of payday from an employer’s perspective but initially leading the reader to think I was writing about the employee. This was an unexpected but very welcome twist derived entirely from allowing myself to think freely. Winning the competition and receiving my very own £50 payday was very welcome.
‘Pay-day meant nothing. The next day there wouldn’t be anything left. Life was just responsibility, demands. With each worker paid, bankruptcy loomed.’
WRITERS BLOCK
Writer’s block can happen for many reasons and if you have zero knowledge of the subject you are writing about or no space to relax and write in, then even the power of mind mapping can’t help.
In many forums, people who have decided to write a story on for example, motor racing, post the question ‘Can anyone tell me about motor racing? I have no experience’. These people don’t have a type of writer’s block that mind mapping can help with!
Mind mapping also won’t help in what is called the ‘distraction block’ where there is just too much going on around you. Some will say go in a quiet room, or sit on a hillside surrounded by wildflowers and the sound of birds, no TV, phone or nagging children. Personally, I need a tidy office to sit in on my own, a full stomach, a bottle of white wine and the TV on in the background showing something that doesn’t need much watching because I’ve seen it 1,000 times before, but is still a good watch – something like ‘TOPGEAR’ or ‘Friends’. It’s all very personal.
We will now look at three other types of writers block (creativity block, psychological block and procrastination block) and show how mind mapping can help.
Creativity block – No ideas.
This is a really common (and probably the most common) type of writer’s block and what many would consider as classic writer’s block. Maybe you are struggling with a plot, a title, or maybe your character is stuck in a dead end.
To resolve this, give yourself an associated theme, or a connected or slightly connected idea related to the story and mind map around it. Obviously if writing for a themed competition or anthology, then the focus of the mind map is self-evident.
It may be a single word, a phrase or situation your character is in but try to make the central theme as succinct as possible, maybe even as a drawing. Writing the whole of your last chapter in the centre of the page won’t be conducive to mind mapping, however a phrase like ‘Drug lord’ or ‘Wedding night’ would allow you to mind map.
The next example is a story I had published in ‘The Tyranny of Bacon’ by Pure Slush Publications, which was an anthology of stories on the tenuous (or not) theme of bacon. I love an obscurely themed anthology to challenge me, but I was struggling for a plot.
Below is the story and then (so not to give away the twist) the mind map which developed the story.
Brown or Red?
He daydreamed of breakfast. Work was stressful and his only solace was the thought of baked beans, hash browns, bacon and of course sauce but which one? There was always a debate over the variety of sauce – red tomato ketchup or fruity brown?
Brown or red? The decision was complex, it always had been and always would be.
Sausages, he would have sausages, two of them to match the number of bacon rashers.
Brown or red? The verdict was weighing heavily on him.
Would he have mushrooms if they were on offer? Of course not. He smiled to himself as he remembered his Corporal telling him how mushrooms were first discovered – by a demon cleaning the fungus between the third and fourth toes of the devil.
Brown or red? He had to decide soon, very soon. It was almost time.
Eggs! He had forgotten about eggs, now there was a hard decision – scrambled, fried or poached? The decision to have scrambled eggs was tough but easy compared to whether it would be brown or red.
What about a vegetarian breakfast? That was an easy decision – no. The brown or red conundrum remained.
Hungry from nerves or simply through a lack of food he wasn’t sure. He knelt carefully in his bulky protective clothing and paused to regulate his breathing. A bead of sweat dripped from his forehead on to the inside of his visor, slightly obscuring his view of the improvised device in front of him.
Again he imagined the breakfast he had planned for himself back at barracks if everything went his way.
For the last time he considered his options. Brown or red?
He cut the red wire.
If not obvious from my rather unfortunate and rapid handwriting, the route my mind took was to the type of sauce you have with bacon – brown or red, which lead me to consider other things of different colours like wires, then bomb disposal, then using that as a twist.
Psychological block – Perfectionism.
This psychological block is basically the writer falling short of what they imagine the story to be or giving up too soon when the text doesn’t immediately meet expectations.
To illustrate this, in my head a scene could be full of colour, depth and information like this photo of Toby, my Border Collie, waiting for me to throw his precious tennis ball.
In my head, my story is like the full colour photo.
However, when written down my story is more like my attempt at drawing the picture and evidently lacking.
Often, advice is simply ‘just write’, but I see this as like telling a depression sufferer to ‘shake it off’ or ‘smile harder’.
This type of writer’s block is hard to get over. A solution is to mind map around one of the foundations of writing for example the character or setting.
Try this exercise to build a deeper, more layered, complex character – take one of your characters, then mind map around the following aspects of them:
- Uniquness
- Flaws
- Goals
- Appearance
- How they act / react in certain situations
It will probably be best to pick one of these at a time, or do them all but in turn. You will soon have created a deeper character and one which may even dictate where the story goes.
My favoured aspect to use, which I suggest you try first would be to mind map how the character acts in certain situations – for example how do they react when they are in a bank queue when there is a robbery?
You don’t need to have or add the bank robbery to your story, but you may find out how they react in a stressful situation.
When I have done this on a character of my own making, the character comes alive, you might even learn something unexpected about him or her even though you created them!
Procrastination block – Can’t get in the zone / put things off
With procrastination being the act of delaying or postponing a task, getting out of this situation may take more than just mind mapping.
Personally, I find that making a clean break from your usual environment, dropping your current project, a reboot of sorts can work. You can then return to your project with renewed vigour. The following will work for many people, if not, then it’s still a very useful exercise in developing your own process of mind mapping.
Go on a field trip with your mind mapping equipment to different locations, maybe a coffee shop, park or shopping centre and people-watch, pick on someone and mind map them a backstory.
You don’t necessarily plan a plot or think of turning it into a story, just give them a history by mind mapping. Next I will show and explain my mind maps of two of my own field trips.
Example 1
I went to my favourite fishing spot on the west coast of Wales, Little Haven, a few miles from my home. I sat, and along came a man in a little boat.
My mind map took me to consider him as a fisherman, maybe on a trip or collecting or dropping off something. My mind went to bait, catching and killing, maybe human? Murder, but who – the wife? Good way to dispose of a body! Putting out as bait, maybe his wife was a real nag, always critical? For this one I even inadvertently came up with a title – not that that’s what we were doing here: ’fishing for complements’ a story about killing and baiting lobster pots with the body parts of his nagging wife.
Example 2
For this exercise I went to a coffee shop, where one of the customers was a very distraught young woman with a crying baby in a pram.
My mind map took me to consider who she was – parent, carer, then paid or not? Which prompted thoughts of ransom or kidnap, but her distraught look made me consider that maybe she was regretful.
Maybe she had stolen the child but was actually taking it back because it was so troublesome.
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SUMMARY
- Don’t wait for writer’s block, practice by using in plot or title development or in everyday life.
- Don’t be intimidated by the theory, create your own style that works for you.
- If you think it, write it down.
Fusilli Writing 