Have you ever found yourself trying to write a paper or craft a speech, staring at your computer screen, trying to line up words into sentences, sentences into paragraphs – struggling to find the structure of what you want to say? Searching for the path to take your reader or viewer on?

Have you ever tried to learn something new and the ideas just don’t stick? The lesson goes into one ear and out the other? *poof* The learning is lost?

Have you ever been deep in the middle of a difficult decision that you feel surrounded by it? Trapped? You’ve longed to rise above it so you could see the big picture and clearly see the decision you need to make?

Have you ever found yourself tackling a REALLY BIG problem, so complex that it feels like a giant, complex tangle? Have you wished you could tease apart the tangle, to pull into apart into solvable pieces?

Have you ever felt overwhelmed? All the to-do’s and ideas buzz around in your head like a swarm of bees. The mental noise is so pervasive you just can’t think straight?

And what happens if you don’t face these challenges?
	The speech falls flat or the paper is unpersuasive.
	The time, energy and money you invest in your education is wasted if you’re not truly learning.
	At best you’re that pesky, not-yet-made decision, at worst you’re plagued by it.
	That REALLY BIG problem goes unsolved, wasting your time, stacking up stress, costing you money, losing opportunities.
	The sense of overwhelm stops you in your tracks before you even get started.

I’ve got the solution to each one of these problems.

It’s at your fingertips.

And all you need is paper, pen and The Idea Shapers.

I wrote my latest book, The Idea Shapers: The power of putting your thinking into your own hands, to help you do just that: take control of your thinking, communicating, learning, decision-making, problem-solving and feeling of overwhelm. To strengthen your visual thinking skills and shape your ideas. To reclaim drawing as your best thinking tool.

You may read that dreaded D-word, drawing, and tense up.

So, who am I?

My name is Brandy Agerbeck. I was that kid who drew all the time. That’s me when I was seven, at my family’s cabin in Webster, Wisconsin, USA. I never stopped drawing. And I am an artist. I even got a Bachelor’s of Art and was a printmaker, intaglio and monoprints, mostly. See? I know fancy art terms. But seven year old me or twenty year old me never would have guessed the work I have done for the past 20 years. I’m a graphic facilitator.

A human can recognize an image in as little as 13 milliseconds! Our culture is increasingly more visual and we are surrounded by media. You are becoming a more sophisticated viewer of visuals, even if you don’t feel capable of making images. Or you don't have the vocabulary to talk about what you see.

I want to change that. I want you to be confident in making drawings to make meaning for yourself. I want you to put that power into your own hands.

Here’s the deal —

I wrote The Idea Shapers because I know from both personal and professional experience how powerful drawing is as a thinking tool. My own first step in bringing anything to life is to grab paper and pen and start sketching. Sometimes those drawings get redrawn and refined later. Often, they don’t need to. That near-scribble of a drawing and scrawl of writing accomplished its task. It shifted my thinking. It got me a step closer to the task at hand.

Here’s a beautiful truth. It’s a secret I am eager to share –

I want YOU to make your own beautifully messy drawings. I want YOU to sharpen your visually thinking skills so you can think critically, communicate clearly, reduce overwhelm. I want you to reclaim drawing as your best thinking tool, to put YOUR thinking into YOUR own hands.

And The Idea Shapers can help.

The Idea Shapers is a book that guides you through a five-step process of visual thinking:

My mission was to take my two decades of drawing professionally for other people, making meaning for them in their meetings, along with my lifetime of personal drawing experience and demystify the complexity of visual thinking. To break it down into building blocks. Each single Idea Shaper is so simple that you think, “I can do that!” You put them into practice for yourself, building block upon block until you are doing more and more complex visual thinking for yourself.

These Idea Shapers are the very same tools I’ve used to build my business, deliver my TEDx speech, craft my books, accomplish countless projects, and simply just manage the hard parts of being human.

I want to teach you the power of putting your thinking into your own hands.
Now, you are welcome to hop over to Amazon and order your copy of The Idea Shapers right now. I’ve even got a got couple sample chapters available for you, for free, on my site.

The Idea Shapers Tour is a day long workshop where I lead you through The Idea Shapers and share hands-on tools that you can use, again and again.

In 2015, I led a successful Kickstarter for this book. And after three years of writing, drawing, idea shaping and idea wrangling, I completed the book and shipped it to my 274 backers. When I saw the supporters I knew personally, I asked, “How’s the book working for you?”

I absolutely understand. I’ve got a lot of those books myself. And at 400+ pages, The Idea Shapers might be a bit intimidating with its heft. (Don’t worry, there’s also hundreds of pictures.)

But here’s the deal. There is solid gold productivity and problem solving tools in this book. The pages of this book have no use until you put them in action. You won’t feel the power of putting your thinking into your own hands until you get your hands on these materials and start USING THEM. You won’t be motivated to practice and do the hard work until you have experienced the ‘aha,’ the relief, the clarity, feel the progress you gain when you make your drawings.

To help you experience The Idea Shapers for yourself, to kickstart your visual thinking practice, I am leading the tour at Helsingor on 13 May from 10:00 am to 5:00pm.

To make it extra easy, your investment in the workshop includes a copy of The Idea Shaper, a kit with the highest-quality pens and paper (6 Neuland markers and your own sketchbook), along with all the materials you need for the day’s exercises. All for you to keep and continue your idea shaping practice. And to help foster your ongoing learning and visual thinking skills, I’ll invite you to the private Idea Shapers community on Facebook.

Grab your spot now! Space is limited and I’m not sure when I’ll next be back in Helsingor.

I’d love to meet you soon and share The Idea Shapers with you 13 May. Click the big, beautiful, red registration below to secure your spot on the tour.

Brandy follows this much-loved volume with her new book for every visual thinker, The Idea Shapers: The power of putting your thinking in your own hands. Cultural analyst Patricia Martin calls it, “A new alphabet for the visual age.”

Blending her experience in speaking, teaching and facilitating, Brandy delivers interactive, customized keynotes and workshops. In her engaging and productive sessions, she demystifies drawing to develop everyone’s thinking skills so your participants can learn more easily, reduce overwhelm, communicate clearly and think critically. You can see her in action in her 2013 TEDxWindyCity talk, “Shape Your Thinking.”

Want more?
Here Brandy's overview of the 5 steps of The Idea Shapers process:

Not in Helsingor? Click here to see Brandy's upcoming events.

If your group or organization is interested in hosting Brandy's Idea Shapers Tour or hiring her to teach a custom workshop or interactive keynote, please contact her here.