The world is divided into people that almost match the way the brain is structured; creative people and uncreative people. As knowledge of the brain grew, this divide became more entrenched instead of being eradicated. People are now being labelled as being ‘left-brained’ and ‘right brained’. The left brained people are the logical, mathematical people and the right brained are the creative, artistic people.

The result? Quotes like: ‘I am not logical’, ‘I cannot problem solve’, ‘I am not creative’, ‘I cannot draw’, ‘I cannot come up with new ideas’. I cannot, I cannot, I cannot…

How do you label yourself?

Tony Buzan, the inventor of Mind Maps, is one of the few people that say that this labelling is simply wrong!

We are not ‘left-brained’ or ‘right-brained’ people. We are ‘whole-brained’ people!

If you feel that you have an inclination to one side, then the more you introduce the ‘other side’ of the brain into your daily life, the better you will perform.

Let’s take me, for example.

I work in the Information Technology field. “Ah, left-brained“, you say!

Yet my websites were conceived and planned using Mind Maps. The layout, the colours, the logo, even the article you are reading at the moment had to be conceptualised first – before implementing.

This conceptualisation and design issues are largely ‘right brain’ activities. Without me applying my ‘right brain’, I would never have been able to put together something like this. I would have remained ‘behind the scenes’, doing the programming and would’ve gotten a ‘right brained’ graphic artist and writer to do the Website layout and write the articles.

Granted, there are probably people better at writing, or better at website layout than I am, but the combination of those functions, brings out the best in me.

The Mind Map is the perfect tool to explore your creativity, as it naturally combines your artistic flair with your logical organizing abilities.

Creative thinking requires you to think in new ways – to be original. Creative thinking involves:

Flexibility

• To be original, you have to be able to see things from different angles.
• You should be able to see existing links between ideas and find new ones.
• You have to see the opposite point of view.
• You have to take old concepts and rearrange them in new ways.
• You need to reverse pre-existing ideas.
• You need to include all your senses in the creation of ideas

Originality

This is the heart of all creative thinking. To be original you have to:

• Be unique
• Be unusual
• Forget about the ‘right’ answer
• Be ‘illogical’
• Break the rules
• Be ambiguous
• Forget about making mistakes
• Be foolish
• Be frivolous
• Introduce ‘play’ into your work

While people think that this is uncontrolled, exactly the opposite is true. Creativity often comes from a great deal of intellectual energy and high levels of concentration.

The Mind Map enables you to do all of this – and more!

Five minutes to being more creative

The next time you have to tackle a project, or something big try the following technique:

• Take out an A4, or larger page
• Turn the page sideways
• Draw a circle in the centre of the page
• Put an image or a description of what you are trying to accomplish in the centre
• Spend five minutes Mind Mapping your ideas and thoughts on the subject
• Take a short break
• Draw a new Mind Map and categorise your thoughts and ideas into what you think are logical groupings

You will now have a graphical overview of what needs to happen. There are often some ’surprises’, which you would never have thought of, if you did not Mind Map it.

If you are not sure how to draw a Mind Map, enrol now for our Free Course on Mind Mapping. Go to classes.mindmaptutor.com and enrol now!

The free course will teach you the Principles of Mind Mapping, as well as the Seven Steps in creating a Mind Map – and more.