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Rant: I used to edit as I wrote, now I just dump the mess and fix it later
I used to sit down and write a paragraph, then go back and fix every comma and word before moving on, and it took me 3 weeks to get through a 5 page story for my writing group in Boise last spring. I would freeze up on sentence two, delete it 11 times, and burn my whole Saturday on one page, then hate the whole thing by Sunday night. About 6 months ago my friend Dana watched me do this at a coffee shop and said, "You are trying to edit a draft that does not exist yet." That line stuck with me. Now I write a garbage version first, typos and all, no backspacing, and I do not let myself reread a single line until the whole thing is done. My first drafts look like a raccoon typed them, but I actually finish them, and the fixing part goes way faster when I have something to fix. The weird part is the bad version is usually closer to what I wanted than the polished half page ever was. So for people who write this way, do you dump it all first or edit as you go, and how do you stop yourself from going back and fiddling?
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skyler_jackson2711d ago
Honestly the same thing happened to me with guitar, I used to stop and fix every wrong note until my roommate pointed out I never actually finished a song that way. Now I just play through the whole thing sloppy and go back after, and it's crazy how much faster I get better. The trick for me is putting my phone in another room so I can't fuss over stuff, maybe that works for writing too.
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