DESIGN PROCESS I : Exploring model ideas

I searched up 'graphs' on google images and came across a 'theme river' - It is a graph "is a visualization that depicts thematic changes in a collection of documents over a period of time using a river metaphor."

Now I wanted to do something illustrative but I was also torn on the idea of illustrating a drawing or using a graph to make it look more professional. Part of my working process has made me realize that trying to depict between the two explains how I go about choosing my work; do I do it my way or do I work to a standard i know others will be satisfied. That is a clash I have with myself every time I work. This time, I wanted to mix the two up a little and do an illustration INSPIRED by this style of graph because I just think it looks pretty because of the colors, but because the graph looks wacky and all over the place which pretty much describes my way of working.