Deferred judgement

We have a tendency to label the things we experience, group them and put them into boxes. In essence, that is half of what mind mapping is about, too. The other half is analyzing the boxes you or someone else has defined. However, there are no boxes and labels in reality. The moment you are labeling something, you are making a judgement: this is X. By labeling we gradually move from confusion to clarity, but with a price: the labels distract and direct our perception.

Labels often have emotional components attached to them, stereotypes and prejudices being a prime example that. These emotions may prevent you from thinking clearly about those subjects. The stronger and clearer a label is for you, the more certain you are that you know what it means. The more certain you are, the less likely you are to learn anything new about it. One way to break out of a box is to accept that you don’t really know. You just think you know. Become curious about how much there is that you don’t know about things around you.