Outlines are outlines

Its interesting to learn about different kinds of outlines, and it definitely sounds like it should just be an simple and effective way to begin writing an essay. So many times I have started my papers with outlines, thinking all I would have to do is change my point form notes into paragraphs and my outline would magically transform itself into an organized and well thought out paper. The problem is that it never works that way!

I always start my outline, and put so much time into developing it into something exactly like what my paper should be, but when it comes to the actual paper it never works. The biggest problem seems to be that I come up with new ideas when it actually comes to the writing, and these new thoughts take me down a completely different road. My papers, as a result look completely different than my outline, and don't even end up being supported by it. Basically what it always ends up being is two different papers, when I only had to write one, when if I had just started with the paper right away I could save myself a lot of time.

The biggest thing to learn from this, I think, is to just use the outline for what it is. It's not the paper, and so it shouldn't be that much work putting it together. The more brief it can be, the better it will be able to support a paper, without taking over. If I keep my outlines to being a broad statement of what my paper will be, I think they may be very helpful. Otherwise, I would rather just write the paper.