Writers – we’re always looking for that magic method
There’s nothing writers like more than reading about other writers and how they work. Maybe if we copy how they did it, we’ll be able to write like them too. I have a shelf of books on writing – and I’m always on the lookout for more. Maybe one day I’ll come across the perfect book, that tells me exactly how to get the perfect words on the page. In the perfect order.
While I’m waiting to find that book I make mistakes all the time. I open a new file and start writing, stacking sentences one after another. I weave in my worries about writing with the content that I’m writing about. Eventually I have a collection of sentences. If they’re for a blog post, I hit publish. And then I move on to the next piece.
If you’re a writer, then you’re going to write because that’s what you do. It’s the way you make sense of the world. If you write about what interests you, then it’s easy to define your audience – it’s you. Writing for yourself is the easiest way to begin. If you write for someone else, that requires you to know them. And that takes time. It’s a bit like making software – often the best software to make is one that “scratches your own itch”. If it works for you then it may work for others. If you’d read it, perhaps others will too.
Through writing, you make something that lasts. So make stuff. Write. Publish. Make videos. That’s the problem with just talking – once you’ve said the words they disappear. Make what you think exist outside you.
This is easier said than done.
Planning is better than failing
The problem is that making something gets complicated very quickly if you don’t have a plan. The more things you have on the page, the harder they are to organize. A document gets unwieldy very quickly. For example, you can order four sentences in 24 ways. Seven sentences? 5,040 ways. 16 sentences – nearly 21 trillion ways.
That’s one of the attractive things about large language models. They’ve got the computational power to take a collection of sentences and order them based on how likely one is to follow the other. That may be useful to speed the process up, but I also worry that offloading this part of what our brain does may not be a good thing. It’s one thing using an electric saw to cut down on the manual work of cutting a lot. It’s another using your brain less.
Now, before you read any further, I think the best piece of writing advice I have come across is Jordan Peterson’s “Essay”. It’s a very prescriptive approach to writing a good paper. I have referred to this document more than I have all the other reference books that I have. There are specific details that many books do well, but this short guide is the best prescription for just getting on and writing a good piece that I have seen.
But I think there are a few small additions that will help me with my own writing. So that’s what I’m doing in this post – jotting down a few reminders so that my future self can spend less time reading about writing and more time just getting on with the job of writing. I forget things quickly, so I hope this helps me the next time I put pen to paper. Or, as you will read shortly, put the pen and paper down and turn on the computer.
Here we go.
Have you done enough research?
If you’re have trouble getting started, the chances are that you’ve not done enough reading yet. There is more material than ever on every topic out there. But it’s not easy to find, even in a world of Google and AI. What comes up first is rarely what you need. You have to keep digging – there’s much more useful content in journals, newspapers and magazines – the places where you have editors and writers working to create useful content that people are willing to pay for. The stuff on the Internet is unfortunately just not good enough. With the exception of Wikipedia.
The trick when taking notes is to write what you think about what you’ve read in your own words. Add academic references, if you need them, as you go along, or link to relevant websites. Another useful trick, which I believe comes from McKinsey, is the dot-dash method, which is a bulleted list that looks like this.
- This is your general point, and it starts with a bulleted list with a dot
- Each point below the top point is supporting evidence, a number or a fact.
- Each of these starts with a dash
Don’t bother with paper notebooks because it’s a pain having to type up your notes later. Put them into the computer as you go, or tap them into your phone. Whatever you do, make sure that you use the native application on your device. I wrote something the other day on Dropbox on the phone. Then I lost it because I think I closed the app. Write on the native app on every machine. Copy the version across when you need to work on it on a new machine. Organise your folders to make it easy to find your drafts later.
You can keep your notes in a single file, or use a file for each reference. As with anything else, the more you have in file, or the more files you have, the more complicated it becomes to manage the corpus of information. Yes, you can search as long as the information is digital, but it’s easier if you cut things down as you go. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
It starts with bullet points
Now that you’ve done your reading, the next step is to write down bullet points. Work from your notes and what you know about the topic. Some will come easier than others, so it’s worth knowing what you’re aiming for. Say you’re writing a 1,000 word blog post. That’s around 10 sentences of 100 words each, in traditional paragraph structure. That means you need at least 10 ideas, so aim to put down around 30-35 bullet points. Maybe more. But don’t stop at 5. Aim for one sentence per bullet.
Okay, you now have a list of bullet points. Copy them to a new document or at the end of the current one, leaving enough space so you don’t confuse the old list with the new. Then start to organize the sentences. Remember that’s it’s very hard to organize all of them in one go. So the way I start it to look at each sentence and figure out if it’s in the beginning, middle or end of the piece. Start moving sentences around. Treat each line like an index card that can be moved to a different location. Put in headings if that helps with the flow.
What we’re trying to do is reduce complexity. Ordering 35 things is difficult. Ordering 5 stacks of 7 points is easier. Ordering 7 points in a stack in order – relatively easy. Move things up and down until you have what looks like a story. When you’ve finished, you’ll have an outline structure.
Copy the outline to the bottom of the page. This will form the skeleton for your first draft. Put the bullets back on the sentences. This will help to visually separate the text you’re going to write from the bullet points. Now it’s time to write.
Writing the first draft
At this point, treat your document like it’s a typewriter – a machine for making words and nothing else. This is not the time to worry about formatting. I get easily distracted by details about page layouts – which is about text formatting, not text generation. It doesn’t matter what software you use to write as long as you’re spending time writing, not fiddling with settings. Make words. You can make them look pretty later.
It’s ok to have a break every once in a while. These breaks help your brain think about what you’ve done – it’s going to be mulling over the sentences and ideas while you’re taking a walk or having a nap. Give yourself time to work on your piece. I’m usually in a rush, I want to get what I’m working on written and posted. But I have to learn to take my time, because nothing is formed perfectly the first time.
Having a routine helps. If you work at the same place, at the same time, with the same tools, the chances are that you’ll get some work done. However, don’t constrain yourself. Sometimes trying a new approach, a different machine, a different place can help you think differently. Time on task is what matters. If you’re stuck, you can go back to the way things were before.
Editing
I think Peterson’s “Essay” tells you what you need to know about editing. I’ve written about that process elsewhere on this blog, so I’m going to focus in this piece on the first draft and the first edit. After that, everything is about making it tighter and better. And then better still.
I’m the kind of person that likes to hold on to what I’ve written. This is odd, because I have no such interest in holding onto material things. I can quite happily throw away most things I own if I had to. So, why am I reluctant to cut sentences – to delete them and forget about them? This has to change.
Think like a sculptor. If you’re working on a block of marble, the figure you’re trying to free is inside the marble somewhere. Each shard you chip off brings you closer to freeing that figure. The shard itself is no longer needed. Treat your sentences that way. Chip away at them and discard the shards – keeping the core that matters. Delete as you go along. If you want, save versions so you can see your progress, a little like taking pictures. You’ll probably never go back to a previous version. Keep cutting away. Be brave. If what you cut was important, it’ll come back to you and you can write it again. Cut away everything that doesn’t advance your story.
Now you have the start of something you can work with. Copy what you’ve done to the bottom of the page and remove all the scaffolding – the headlines and bullet points. It’s time to start editing.
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Now, I’m going to stop here and post this blog post. I’m also going to upload the pdf of the document behind this post so you can see the steps that led to this version. Now, it’s not like this is finished or perfect – it needs several rounds of editing to tighten before it’s ready to publish in a magazine, for instance. But remember – I’m writing this for future me to start with.
Handcrafted insight 