Lately, I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the larger context within which we use mind mapping and other productivity tools. Namely, how do these tools empower us to make a difference in our work and their lives, to give us more meaning and purpose?
That got me to thinking: Isn’t mind mapping the perfect tool to encourage a mindset of abundance? After all, it enables you to do a better job of brainstorming new possibilities and opportunities, and to thoroughly think through and analyze an abundance of choices that lie before you.
To better understand what I mean, we first need to define two mindsets:
Scarcity: Many people are stuck in a mindset that views all resources as limited and scarce. They tend to view life as a zero-sum game, where there’s only so much (money, opportunities, happiness, and anything else that has value to you) to go around. If everything is finite, the more you take, the less I can have.
Abundance: The abundance mindset says there’s more than enough to go around. Not only that, people who have an abundance mentality view their minds as generative, able to create more of what matters and to creatively leap over the problems they face. That, in turn, means that you can be more generous to others. You don’t have to hoard, because your thinking is no longer walled in by a fear of scarcity. You can give freely, expecting nothing in return, confident in the knowledge that you can always create more.
It seems to me, then, that mind mapping helps to promote a mindset of abundance. By its very nature, it encourages multi-dimensional, expansive thinking. It encourages you to generate more ideas and consider more options. There’s almost no limit to how much detail and how many levels of thoughts you can place within a mind map. Users of mind mapping are, more often than not, creative problem solvers who view themselves as limitless fonts of ideas, and who share them freely with others.
In addition, I believe the thought-expanding capabilities of mind mapping and other creative tools stay with you, even when you’re not using them. I believe what Oliver Wendell Holmes had to say on this subject: “The mind, once expanded to the dimensions of larger ideas, never returns to its original size.”
So that’s my theory, in a nutshell.
What do you think? What’s been your experience? Does mind mapping promote a mindset of abundance or not?
Please share tour thoughts in the comments area below. I look forward to reading your insights!
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