15 Comments

I use a gps to navigate around on my mind map. I prefer the Australian female voice for direction giving, since I’m less inclined to get irritated when sent off on a tangent that dead ends. I figure she spends her down time between giving me bad directions by smashing beer cans on her forehead and slurping the foam as it drips off her sloping Neanderthal brow. It gives me reason to be empathetic.

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Jun 22Liked by Joyce Wycoff

Sorry but what popped into my head as I read this was, if you try to map my mind you would end up lost in a swamp because my mind is all over the place on a good day and in a swamp on a bad day

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Jun 22Liked by Joyce Wycoff

i'm in the same sinking ship! I wonder how an ADHD mind can be mapped or reined in enough but i like the idea - seems non linear and maybe better for more right brained people.

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author

It was interesting to see people’s response … I think it was much more transformative for “left brain” people … seemed to set them free. Some of the more “right brain” people thought it was too restrictive. ;-)

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;-) That’s the reason we only map our own minds.

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I enjoy reading about writer's proud accomplishments! Congrats.

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Jun 22·edited Jun 22Liked by Joyce Wycoff

wow - i knew you were a great writer for a long time once i learned about your substack. I think I would like your book better than any of the 'modern' ones using chat gpt, AI, and the very things that will probably be the undoing of humanity ultimately and in the not too distant future.

Interesting... I did a search for 'mindmapping book' and the algorhythms went crazy listing this guy's books - he claims to be the 'originator' of it all - good bit of chest beating there IMO. I couldn't help wondering if this was the person who tried to prevent your publishing your book, or simply one of many. he wrote a mess of books on it (pun intended) and died in 2019. I do not mention names in case of lawsuit-happy people with nothing better to do than try to sue for slander. 'Nuff said!

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That’s the right one and he made a lot of great contributions to the field. I never understood his position. He also would do 3-day workshops teaching the tool when it was so easy, people could start doing it in 5 minutes. Strange.

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affairs of the heart and ego remain mysteries to me - including my own, haha - i guess some folks are either/or people. some are 'and' peopoe, ie the more the merrier. this gent sounded like the former.

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Interesting Joyce. Love hearing your backstory and your publishing success. Also love that you knew Fred Klein. Great person.

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Actually, I don’t know Fred Klein … ???

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Oh, he was mentioned under Chic News Company and he’d worked for Avon. Fred Klein was a former publishing executive who got the idea for paperbacks or guess mass market size at the time. He left publishing and moved to Santa B and was well known in writing-pub circles here. He was just this neat older fellow, really nice and had great pub stories. I just figured it was That Fred Klein. My error!

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What an interesting connection! Thanks.

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Sometimes a little context adds value. I bought and used Mindmapping in 1991. I'm glad I had a lot of experience with mind mapping before hyperlinks and Building a Second Brain--and now ChatGPT, took over the personal knowledge management world. Generations coming up behind me will totally miss the development of neural pathways in the brain that come with exercises like doing math without a computer, writing without a spell checker or grammar checker, cursive writing, and reading a map you bought at the next gas station on your way to not knowing where you are. Peter Drucker provided hundreds of truths about business and careers and the one I notice which bears out over time is this one: The person who has never worked in a traditional office environment, with many others, with mentors, with an office culture, and perhaps in a large building with other companies, will struggle as an entrepreneur or one-person monopoly. They lack the context of work and wisdom.

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Thanks, Georgia ... not that I would go back, but I, too, am glad I got to experience some of these tools prior to their computerization.

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