Brain Dump, Then Prune Hard — Plan Your Course

You know your outcomes. You know your audience. You have a module structure. Now comes the part where most creators get stuck: figuring out what actually goes inside each module.

The solution is a three-step process. Dump. Organize. Prune. The order matters. Do them out of sequence and you’ll end up with either a disorganized mess or a sparse outline that’s missing important pieces.

Step 1: The Brain Dump

Open a blank document. Set a timer for 20 minutes. Write down everything you know about your topic that could possibly be relevant to your course.

Don’t organize. Don’t edit. Don’t judge whether something is “good enough.” Just write. Every concept, technique, story, example, warning, tip, and common mistake you can think of.

Some people prefer doing this with sticky notes or a whiteboard. One idea per note. Spread them all over a table. The physical format doesn’t matter. The lack of filtering does.

The goal is to get everything out of your head and into a visible format. Your brain is bad at holding 50 ideas simultaneously. Paper (or a document) is good at it.

Don’t worry about order, grouping, or whether something belongs in this course or a future one. Get it all out. You’ll sort it later.

If you run dry before the timer goes off, ask yourself:

What do people always ask me about this topic?
What mistakes did I make when I was learning this?
What would I tell a friend who asked me for help with this?
What’s the one thing nobody explains well that I wish someone had told me?

Step 2: Organize Into Clusters

Now look at everything you dumped. Start grouping related ideas together.

You’ll notice natural clusters forming. All the content about audience research ends up in one pile. All the content about writing emails in another. All the content about pricing in another.

These clusters map roughly to your modules. Some clusters will be too big (split them). Some will be too small (merge them with related clusters). Some won’t fit anywhere (set them aside).

Within each cluster, start putting items in a logical order. What needs to come first? What builds on what? What’s foundational and what’s advanced?

You’re not writing lessons yet. You’re arranging raw material into a sequence that makes sense.

Step 3: The Prune

This is where most creators fail. They dump and organize well, but they can’t bring themselves to cut anything.

Here’s the pruning question for every single item on your list:

“Is this absolutely necessary for my student to achieve the outcome I promised?”

Not “is this interesting.” Not “did I spend years learning this.” Not “would a sophisticated audience appreciate this.” Is it necessary for the outcome?

If yes, keep it. If no, cut it or move it to your parking lot document.

Be ruthless. The number one cause of bad courses isn’t lack of content. It’s too much content. Students drowning in information they don’t need, unable to find the signal in the noise.

Every time you’re unsure about cutting something, cut it. You can always add it back. You can make it a bonus. You can save it for course two. The course will be better without it than with it “just in case.”

What to Do With the Pruned Content

Keep a parking lot document. Everything you cut goes there, organized by theme.

This document becomes your most valuable asset for future content:

Module ideas for your next course
Bonus material for launches
Blog post topics
Social media content
Lead magnet ideas
Student FAQ answers

You’re not throwing anything away. You’re being intentional about what goes in this specific course.

The Sequence Check

After pruning, walk through your outline from start to finish. Read it as if you’re a student seeing it for the first time.

Ask yourself:

Does each lesson follow logically from the previous one?
Are there gaps where the student would feel lost?
Is anything explained before its prerequisite?
Does the overall arc build toward the promised outcome?

Move things around until the flow feels natural. You’re looking for a clear, easy-to-follow path from the first lesson to the last.

This step is worth spending 30 minutes on. The right sequence makes a course feel effortless. The wrong sequence makes it feel confusing, even if the individual lessons are good.