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One mistake a lot of people make while writing code, slides, essays and so on, is trying to structure the ideas too soon in the process. Throwing ideas on a pa

One mistake a lot of people make while writing code, slides, essays and so on, is trying to structure the ideas too soon in the process. Throwing ideas on a paper in no particular order and in a few words will exercise the least possible the part of you that expresses idea, and keep the one that generate ideas in focus. Then after you have exhausted the muse, you can start ordering them, chaining them, then putting full sentences, sections, or code blocks, functions and classes. So the other should be, generate as many ideas as possible, then express them, structure them, put them in shape. Then generate ideas again. Then structure again. But not at the same time. Because expressing things needs a structure, while creativity thrive without it.

mszcz 4y ago
This drove me nuts when I was writing my master thesis. Professor handling it insisted on writing the outline first and then, in order (!), each of the chapters. I found that approach problematic, at least for me. How was I supposed to know from the get-go what problems I'll stumble upon, what the conclusions will be, what pivots I'll make. So I just ignored that and started out in the middle, wrote what I knew when I knew it, and then progressed outward to more general, summary chapters. Turned out ok and I think with a lot less rewriting had I listened to her advice. "From the middle out" ;)