On Writing: Brainstorming

In a previous post, I briefly addressed psycho-epistemology—the interaction between the conscious mind and the subconscious mind in the writing process. When we brainstorm, we must rely on the subconscious mind.

The purpose of writing is to communicate. Effective writing makes it easy for the reader to comprehend the main point being communicated. This requires one’s points to be organized and integrated.

Unfortunately, when given a writing assignment, many people simply begin writing. A thought pops into their head, and they write it down. Then another thought pops into their head, and they write that down. They continue doing this until they believe they have written enough. The result is a disorganized mess that is difficult, and perhaps impossible, to understand.

Thoughts do not occur to us in an organized manner. Some of our thoughts may be irrelevant to the point we want to communicate. Some thoughts will be more important than others. However, if we write our thoughts as they occur to us, we jump from point to point with no obvious connection between them. We fail to communicate effectively, and the reader is confused.

The solution is a two-step process: brainstorming and developing an outline. I will address developing an outline in a future essay.

Brainstorming is the process of capturing our thoughts and ideas as they occur to us. We should allow our subconscious to run wild. When we are brainstorming, we aren’t concerned with the quality, relevance, or importance of the thoughts and ideas. We are simply creating a random list.

The complexity of our writing project will determine how much time we should spend brainstorming. A 400-word essay is less complex than a 400-page book. An essay will have fewer points than a book, and the theme will be narrower.

To illustrate, the following is a partial list of the thoughts I had for this essay:

• Explain importance of brainstorming
• Brainstorming and outline
• Writing without brainstorming
• Organization, relevance, importance of thoughts
• Describe brainstorming

If I had written the essay in the order that the thoughts occurred to me, the result would be disorganized and confusing. However, by brainstorming first, I can identify which points are the most relevant and important. Once I have done that, I can organize the points logically—develop an outline.