With all this change happening and less free time I knew I needed to come up with a system of organization. It was important that I had a "map" to help me continue my jazz piano development and learning. It's essential to me that no matter what's going on in my life that I'm still practicing for myself and further developing my personal artistry.
Based off some inspiration by percussionist and fellow blogger Mark Powers, I decided to do a mind map to help me organize my time and my thoughts. I knew that if I didn't write something like this down I'd let many things get in the way of my jazz piano development. Perhaps I'd skip days of practice or be inconsistent and jump around. Neither of these are great ways to practice. Focus and consistency are the key.
Anyway, after doing this map (see below) I feel more focused than I have in maybe a year. I sat down for 30 minutes and just did a simple organization of my ideas. I had done goal lists before but this was different. This had a visual component that really has made a huge difference. Since I responded so well to this visually I wanted to make sure I could always have access to it. I decided to print 3 copies. One I posted above my piano, another one is posted above my keyboard, and I put the last copy in my practice log.
It's always there as a reference point for me when I'm uncertain what I should be working on or feel the need to start jumping around too much.
I highly recommend you develop your own artistic mindmap. I used MindMeister which has a free and a paid option.
Happy mindmapping and let me know how it turns out for you!
Hey, Steve- I'm super glad that the mind mapping has helped you out so much! Thanks for the mention and link- Mark Powers
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