Use looping.

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Looping is especially useful for the first stages of exploring a topic. As its name suggests, looping involves writing quickly to explore some aspect of a topic and then looping back to your original starting point or to a new starting point to explore another aspect. Beginning with almost any starting point, looping enables you to find a center of interest and eventually a thesis for your essay. The steps are simple:

  1. Write down your area of interest. You may know only that you have to write about another person or a movie or a cultural trend that has caught your attention. Or you may want to search for a topic in a broad historical period or for one related to a major political event. Although you may wander from this topic as you write, you will want to keep coming back to it. Your purpose is to find a focus for writing.
  2. Write nonstop for ten minutes. Start with the first thing that comes to mind. Write rapidly, without looking back to reread or to correct anything. Do not stop writing. Keep your pencil moving or keystrokes clacking. Continuous writing is the key to looping. If you get stuck for a moment, rewrite the last sentence. Follow diversions and digressions, but keep returning to your topic.
  3. After ten minutes, pause to reread what you have written. Decide what is most important—a single insight, a pattern of ideas, an emerging theme, a visual detail, anything at all that stands out. Some writers call this a “center of gravity” or a “hot spot.” To complete the first loop, restate this center in a single sentence.
  4. Beginning with this sentence, write nonstop for another ten minutes.
  5. Summarize in one sentence again to complete the second loop.
  6. Keep looping until one of your summary sentences produces a focus or thesis. You may need only two or three loops; you may need more.