Thinking on Canvas
How to use Muse as a brainstorming partner that draws its thinking: a loose ask, a list of ideas, then a Mermaid mind map you can read, extend and test.
Thinking on Canvas
How to use Muse as a brainstorming partner that draws its thinking: a loose ask, a list of ideas, then a Mermaid mind map you can read, extend and test.
You come away knowing how to ask loosely and then judge ideas out loud, how to get a map as plain text a renderer can draw, how to push the outer branches toward grounded examples, and what to do when the diagram will not render.
Honest about how it was made: this film was drafted in Muse and then cleaned up and rebuilt with Claude. The film cuts a motive the record does not support, shows the reasoning setting as Meta names it, says Mermaid's own docs call mind maps experimental, and replaces "blame the tool" with a test you can run yourself: paste the text into a clean renderer first. Session details attributed to the course could not be re-checked against a verbatim transcript and are voiced as Andrew Brown's account.
A note that opens the film Muse drafted this, Claude cleaned it up. This film began as a rough draft made with Muse. Muse runs on a simple model called Spark, and Spark makes a lot of mistakes, so Claude cleaned the draft up. The method is the point: draft in Muse, then finish in Claude or Codex. One kind of mistake we looked for: a draft Muse diagram of two big boxes and a check mark under a question about whether a non-technical person could use it, with both boxes empty. A diagram that shows nothing teaches nothing, so Claude replaced diagrams like this one.
Narrated by Liam, in for Bear. Narration is an AI voice; the film was made with AI tools.
Chapters 0:00 Muse note 0:28 The idea and the key terms 1:03 The Ask 1:51 The Picture 2:47 The Branches 3:17 When Tools Fight Back 4:01 Recap 4:18 Your Turn
Your turn Paste this into Claude: I'm brainstorming [describe your topic in one sentence]. First give me ten ideas as single-point bullets, one line each. Then write a Mermaid mind map of the whole topic as plain text, one branch per theme, and output only the Mermaid code. Then check two things yourself. Does the Mermaid text draw in Mermaid's live editor? And does the map show you a link or a gap that the bullet list did not?
Sources shown on screen Meta's public docs at dev.meta.ai (models, reasoning) and Mermaid's docs at mermaid.js.org (introduction, mind map syntax) and its live editor, captured 2026-10-07. Narration follows a Muse course taught by Andrew Brown, named on screen. Nothing here is a product endorsement.
Part of the playlist Muse for Educational AI.
@NikBearBrown
What this video covers
- 0:00 — Muse note
- 0:28 — The idea and the key terms
- 1:03 — The Ask
- 1:51 — The Picture
- 2:47 — The Branches
- 3:17 — When Tools Fight Back
- 4:01 — Recap
- 4:18 — Your Turn
Transcript
A lightly formatted transcript of the video, with timestamps so you can jump to any section on YouTube.
Muse note
[0:00] A note before we start, this film began as a rough draft made with Muse. Muse runs on a simple model called Spark and Spark makes a lot of mistakes. So, Claude cleaned this draft up. The method is the point, draft in Muse then finish in Claude or Codex. Here is the kind of mistake we looked for. A draft diagram from Muse, two big boxes and a check mark under a question about whether a non-technical person could use it. Both boxes are empty. A diagram that shows nothing teaches nothing. So, Claude replaced diagrams like this one.
The idea and the key terms
[0:28] Hello, this is Liam from Bear. Ask an AI to help you brainstorm and you usually get a list. This lecture is about asking for picture instead, a map of the ideas that you can look at, argue with and sharpen. How to ask for one, why it works and what to do when the picture won't appear. Six terms, Muse Spark, Meta's main model which you call over the internet. Reasoning effort, how long the model thinks before it answers. To brainstorm is to throw out ideas fast and judge them later. A mind map is ideas branching out from one center. Mermaid is plain text that a tool turns into a diagram. An iteration is going around again, sharper each pass. Make the
The Ask
[1:03] Plugins funner. That was Andrew Brown's first request and it was loose. He teaches a course on Muse, Meta's AI models and in this lesson he was working on plugins for a community website. Then he asked for ideas as single point bullets he could review. He had reasoning effort on X High, a dial for how long Muse Spark thinks before it answers. Meta's docs list the levels from minimal up to max and note that more effort means more tokens, more waiting and more cost. Back came a list of ideas. It included deploy confessions, a one-click coffee match, a code review thunderdome and a kudos terminal. Those are the four Andrew read out. The list ran longer. Then came the step that makes it a brainstorm. He judged the ideas out loud. Some were good. One left him puzzled. His words, "I don't understand that part, but that's okay. The judging is the work." A list tells you what is
The Picture
[1:52] There. It does not tell you how the pieces fit. So, Andrew asked for different shape, a mind map of community engagement, one center with branches growing off it. Here is the catch, new spark answers in text only. Meta's model table lists text as its one output. So, a map has to arrive as text and something else has to draw it. That something is mermaid, a tool that draws diagrams from plain text. For mind map, the text is an outline. Indent a line under another and it becomes a branch. Here, B and C sit under A and under root. Andrew's map had one center, community. Five branches grew from it, learning and growth, experimentation, participation, identity and belonging and recognition. Then he read the map out. Under learning and growth, daily challenges and skill building. Under participation, ask questions, debate chambers, shout boxes. Under identity and belonging, who's online, your stack, your presence. Under recognition, being seen.
The Branches
[2:47] Then he went deeper. For the outer branches, he asked for two to three grounded plug-in examples each, with each branch in its own color. After his feedback, the model revised the map a little deeper. This is the move. The map gives you the territory, then you fill it in one branch at a time until a vague idea has become a list of things you could actually build. Look at the whole session and you can see a loop. Ask in plain words, ask for picture, push back, deeper, grounded, clearer, then go round again and the picture comes out sharper each time. Then the tooling fought back.
When Tools Fight Back
[3:18] Pacing the map into his editor failed again and again. His fix was a fresh folder and a preview plug-in and after that, it rendered. A renderer that does only this is mermaid's own live editor, text on the left, map on the right. Click its mind map sample and an outline becomes a map. Mermaid's docs call mind maps experimental, so the syntax can change. That gives you a test. When a diagram won't draw, paste the model's text into a clean renderer. If it draws there, the text is fine and the trouble is your editor. Andrew's verdict, the mermaid part, not the model. That is thinking on canvas. The model writes the map as text, a tool draws it, and you push back on what you see. A list is a starting point. A picture is something you can argue with, improve, and build
Recap
[4:01] From. Let's recap with Claude. Ask loosely for ideas, then judge them out loud. Ask for the map as mermaid text. The model writes text, and a tool draws it. Fill the map in branch by branch, and loop ask, draw, refine until it is sharp. When the picture won't draw, test the text in a clean renderer before you blame the model.
Your Turn
[4:19] Your turn. Paste this into Claude. I'm brainstorming. Describe your topic in one sentence. First, give me 10 ideas as single point bullets, one line each. Then, write a mermaid mind map of the whole topic as plain text, one branch per theme, and output only the mermaid code. Then, check two things yourself. Does the mermaid text draw in Mermaid's live editor? And does the map show you a link or a gap that the bullet list did not? Thinking on canvas at Nick Bear Brown.
