My favourite way of "chunking" chords (i.e how to think of them to remember them) is to "decompose" them to think about them in a different way. For example: T

My favourite way of "chunking" chords (i.e how to think of them to remember them) is to "decompose" them to think about them in a different way. For example: Think of Bbmaj7 as just Dm with Bb as the bass. Bb + Dm. It turns out that this pattern always works for the maj7 chords. Another example: Cmaj7 "is" Em with C as the bass. Think of Cm7 as Eb with C as the bass. C7 is Edim with C as the bass. These decompositions are just a different way to see the same chords, maybe it helps some people to form associations/connections about these shapes in some way. Of course, once played enough, a chord is simply remembered as it is, its own thing.