Why Every Business Needs a Treasure Map

jen62845
Aug 6
4 min read

What business owners can learn from crews that actually make it to the treasure.

Everyone wants the treasure. Few make a map.

Picture it:

A scruffy crew of pirates hunched over a glowing parchment in the captain’s quarters. Lanterns flicker.

The ship creaks. They’re not guessing. They’re planning. There’s a course, a red X, and a clear route through dangerous waters.

That’s what a good Monday morning huddle should look like.

But in a lot of small businesses?

The “map” is still in the owner's head
The team’s doing their best — but they don’t always know where it’s headed
And the day-to-day waves hit before anyone has a chance to steer

pirates huddle over a map planning their treasure hunt

Your Brain Wasn’t Built to Hold the Entire Plan

Here’s what cognitive science has to say about why business feels so overwhelming when the plan stays in your head:

1. Cognitive Offloading: Your brain can hold the plan — or think clearly about the plan. But not both.

We like to believe we can juggle everything in our heads — and for a while, it even feels like we are.

But here’s what’s actually happening behind the scenes:

Your brain’s working memory can hold about 4 to 7 items at a time. That’s it.

When you're mentally tracking all the moving parts of your business — deadlines, who’s doing what, what’s slipping, what’s next — you're using up all that space just remembering.

And while it might feel like you’re thinking strategically, what you’re actually doing is mentally replaying a to-do list on loop.

No mental room left for pattern recognition, decision-making, or solving the deeper problems.

The result?

Neither memory nor strategy is working at full strength.

Details fall through the cracks, and bigger-picture insights get missed.

It’s like trying to run a meeting while reciting your grocery list backward. You can try — but both are going to suffer.

2. The Zeigarnik Effect: Your brain won’t let go of unfinished business

Ever notice how you keep thinking about something you didn’t finish — even if it’s small?

That’s the Zeigarnik Effect in action: your brain holds onto unfinished tasks like open tabs in a browser.

They stay active in your mental background — quietly draining your focus and energy.

Even if you’re not consciously thinking about it, your brain keeps “checking in” on that unassigned task, that unsent email, that thing you meant to follow up on. It’s constantly asking:

“Is this handled yet? Is this handled yet?”

Multiply that by every project, every deadline, and every little responsibility you’re tracking in your head — and suddenly, your mental dashboard is a chaotic mess of blinking lights.

Writing the plan down — even in rough form — signals to your brain:

“I’ve seen this. I know what to do. You can stop reminding me now.”

And your brain finally relaxes.

The mental tabs close.

You sleep better. You focus faster. You make decisions without that constant low-grade tension buzzing in the background.

3. Visual Thinking: Your brain understands maps better than lists

Your brain isn’t optimized for juggling abstract to-do lists.

It’s optimized for space, motion, and direction.

That’s why seeing a plan laid out — whether it’s a timeline, a kanban board, a roadmap, or yes, even a literal pirate map — helps your brain make sense of what’s happening in a way that a verbal plan never could.

When you visualize your work, you activate the parts of your brain designed for navigation — the same ones that help you plan a route across town or mentally walk through a house you’ve only visited once.

You don’t just know what to do —

You see where it fits.

You feel what’s urgent.

You spot the blockers.

You notice what’s missing.

And that clarity helps you shift from reacting to everything to actually directing something.

Written lists can feel overwhelming because they’re flat. There’s no sense of time, no hierarchy, and no path — just a pile of things to do.

Visual plans, on the other hand, create structure, priority, and flow — exactly what your brain needs to stop spinning and start executing.

Planning Isn’t Fancy. It’s Survival.

We like to romanticize the chaos.

We call it “being agile” or “keeping things flexible.”

But underneath that? It’s usually just mental overload.

And when the plan only lives in your head, the cost adds up fast: