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Deleted member 855230
Guest
I've learned something recently that has been helping me with my writing. Keeping on topic.
Sounds obvious, but it's pretty damned easy to go on a random tangent, and then wonder how you got to wherever you landed. Usually you'll find yourself in that place, because you'll be writing, and then you wonder: "How the hell am I going to segway into my next point?"
The trick, is to boil everything down to nothing.
"Introduced article about keeping on topic.
Used an example of what not to do.
Told the basic technique and/or concept.
Wrote a super simple example.
Explained it conversationally.
Summarized the effect.
Concluded the topic.
Opened for discussion."
What you're doing is cutting out all the fat. You don't need any conversational. You don't need to fluff the writing up with emotion or use any adjectives to describe stuff. You just write like a robot. Why? Because it's the first draft. It's sort of like a hybrid between an outline and a first draft. I have been practicing this recently as a way to make sure the article is going to get the point across. And THEN I can go back later and add persuasion or emotion where it's needed. Do this for each of your sections, and before you know it, you have written an article and didn't waste any damned time doing it!
So to summarize, if you're going to try this out, write your stuff out like above and you're essentially giving yourself an instruction list on how to stay on topic, write effectively, and get your article done.
Do you do it differently? Maybe I'm doing it wrong... How do you guys do YOUR writing?
Sounds obvious, but it's pretty damned easy to go on a random tangent, and then wonder how you got to wherever you landed. Usually you'll find yourself in that place, because you'll be writing, and then you wonder: "How the hell am I going to segway into my next point?"
The trick, is to boil everything down to nothing.
"Introduced article about keeping on topic.
Used an example of what not to do.
Told the basic technique and/or concept.
Wrote a super simple example.
Explained it conversationally.
Summarized the effect.
Concluded the topic.
Opened for discussion."
What you're doing is cutting out all the fat. You don't need any conversational. You don't need to fluff the writing up with emotion or use any adjectives to describe stuff. You just write like a robot. Why? Because it's the first draft. It's sort of like a hybrid between an outline and a first draft. I have been practicing this recently as a way to make sure the article is going to get the point across. And THEN I can go back later and add persuasion or emotion where it's needed. Do this for each of your sections, and before you know it, you have written an article and didn't waste any damned time doing it!
So to summarize, if you're going to try this out, write your stuff out like above and you're essentially giving yourself an instruction list on how to stay on topic, write effectively, and get your article done.
Do you do it differently? Maybe I'm doing it wrong... How do you guys do YOUR writing?