Do you find editing the hardest part of writing?

When the initial burst of creativity wears off, do you feel like you’re trapped in a soul-sucking slog? Or forever stuck three-quarters of the way finished?

I’ve been doing a lot of writing recently, and it’s been HARD. Way harder than I thought it would be to take my pile of notes and edit them into something I judged a finished product.

I continued to persevere and came up with a process I’ve been using to make things easier and more intuitive. Having this ‘map’ gives me a sense of progress as to where I am with putting my writing together. It makes me confident I have a wide range of tools in my toolbox whenever I get stuck.

Feel free to repeat some steps if you need to, or change the order around. Move on to the next step or take a break whenever you feel your progress slowing or find yourself struggling.

Environment and tools

I use Ulysses as my primary piece of writing software.

It’s easy to take the word count, whether you’ve highlighted a section, one or more files, or the whole folder. Seeing those numbers is powerful and motivating for me.

I love how easy it is to make folders, switch between files, or drag them up and down to re-order them.

I write in Markdown so I can easily add headings, emphasis, bullet points, formatted links, and dividers without reaching for a mouse or trying to highlight something. I can export it to HTML or paste the Markdown directly into most web publishing platforms.

Depending on what you’re doing, a simple text document or Google Docs file with headings you can jump between may likely be all you need.

Brain Vomit

When inspiration strikes, write some brain vomit.

Write notes, rambles, half-formed sentences, even decently formed paragraphs. Sometimes you might find several coming out if it’s something that’s been stewing inside you for days.

They can be out of order, or unrelated parts of what you’re writing.

It can be done when you’re right in the middle of Seriously Editing something else and your thoughts wandered while you were thinking ahead.

I generally reach for a computer here, because if something has been stewing inside me that long that it’s convinced me I need to write it down, it tends to tumble out quite quickly.

Organise your notes

When you’re ready to get serious about more than just brain vomit, start ordering your notes in the way you want them to go.

Add headings to clarify and group topics together. These will also help orient yourself as the document expands so you don’t get lost scrolling through it. For creative writing you’ll delete these when you’re done, for non-fiction you’ll clarify and refine them further.

Look over your outline and fill in what gaps you can. If you’re struggling too much just relax and move on to the next step and watch it evolve from there.

Write it out by hand

Now, once you have your notes and your current outline ready, find a colourful pen you like writing with. I like to fill up a fountain pen with a bright and unusual colour.

Open your notes next to you, find something to write on, and then start writing your first attempt by hand.

I initially resisted doing this, because the thought of writing up that much by hand seemed like it would take forever. But then I thought about how long it was taking me to refine and complete something at the computer anyway. I also thought about the extra pain and difficulty I struggled with from a digital interface separating me from my writing. So I decided that if it cut down the overall writing time or made the writing process come more naturally, it was worth it.

If there are sections of my notes that are quite well-formed I generally skip over those when I’m handwriting and just leave some way of indicating that they go there. This cuts down the amount of handwriting I have to do. The draft will tend to expand after the initial handwriting pass, so you need to write up less than you think.

I frequently use the back of the sheets from the previous chapter or post I’ve printed out if I have that available. Make sure to write the page number on them so you can keep them ordered.

Otherwise I write in a budget notebook. The cheaper it is the better I feel about writing something that isn’t perfect.

My goal here is to generally get to about 5 pages. It may be different for you, depending on the size you write at. My writing is on the larger side, especially if I’m using a larger nib, and I don’t usually have lines on the paper I’m using.

Type it up

Type your handwritten draft up, making any easy or obvious changes as you go.

Sometimes I’m staring at my piece of paper for several sentences, touch typing it up, then going back and fixing the typos. I’m currently experimenting with the dictation feature on my Macbook to see if that makes it any faster.

Once it’s done, I go through it once or twice, as it is generally easy to see a bunch of edits that can be made. I add in any new subheadings I need.

When the speed and ease of changes start slowing down, I move on to printing it out.

Print it out

Print the whole thing out onto physical paper. Make sure it’s easy enough to have your printer working, so you don’t put off or skip this step. (If you have a wifi printer, make sure you have the drivers installed, work out which wifi network you need to be on, etc.)

Try to make sure there are enough spaces between the lines and on the margins to leave notes. I can’t work out how to print the Markdown as HTML from Ulysses properly so I tend to be left with my draft in Markdown, but it’s easy enough to read.

Scrawl All Over It

Now take your funky coloured pen, and start scrawling all over it.

Cross out any words or phrases that don’t make sense. Write in new ones. Draw arrows moving paragraphs around. Re-write things. Cross out whole paragraphs. Scrawl new ones in the margins. Or on the back.

Sometimes I circle words or draw a wavy line under some parts to indicate I’m not happy with how something flows, but I can’t think of what to re-write it as yet.

I would shy away from a ‘judgmental’ red pen, or a boring black pen here (to contrast the black ink better and add more colour), but use whatever you like the best.

Type back up the changes

After a while it can get a bit difficult to visualise how all the changes you’ve been scribbling out fit together. This is when I go back and start typing up each of the changes I’ve made, crossing them out as I go to remember which ones I’ve done.

Scan it with a Grammar analysis tool

I recently found out about a tool called the Hemingway Editor. It astonished me with how the suggestions made my writing snappier and more focused. I can’t bear the thought of going without pasting my writing into a tool like this before I publish it now.

This is a new step for me, so I’ve yet to work out the exact stage of my process to slot it in to. I’d pick a point where you’re focused on the nitty-gritty of how you’re putting the sentences together. Then I’d use it as a final check before you hit publish.

I’m also figuring out which tools and their incarnations to use. At the moment, I paste it into both the Hemingway Editor and the free version of Grammarly. I love how Grammarly catches a lot of subtle grammar and spelling errors. Unfortunately it doesn’t offer passive voice detection on the free tier, unlike Hemingway.

Pick up the pen again for tricky bits

If a paragraph or sentence is feeling ‘stuck’, try picking up the pen again and writing it out by hand a few times.

Another tip is to duplicate the paragraph or sentence, and then start re-wording or typing it out again several times. Then paste the old and unwanted paragraphs into what I call the Graveyard.

Keep a Graveyard

Keep a ‘Graveyard’ in a file next to your draft or in a section at the bottom of it. Use this to paste things in so you’re not worried about changing or deleting anything.

As a programmer I have toyed with using version control to manage changes and edits to my writing. I wanted to be able to delete things with impunity, but I found that a lot of writing software doesn’t play nicely with source control. (They tend to add a whole lot of extra files or formatting in a way that was never intended for a human to read which makes the diffs very unwieldy to use. Sometimes they also get confused when you abruptly reload from disk.)

Plain IDEs don’t have ‘drag and drop’ ordering functionality in the sidebar. I have to rename everything in alphabetical or numeric order to reorder it, which is a pain.

With:

• A copy of your initial handwriting
• The living copy on your computer
• A printed copy when doing the second revision
• The ‘graveyard’ tip preserving anything you aren’t quite sure you want to let go of

I haven’t felt the need to add source control on top of this process yet. Make a list of remaining changes

When drawing nearer to the end I make a list of places I know I still have left to edit, and start crossing them off.

This gives me a tangible sense of getting close to the finish line, because it’s easy to feel stuck here.

You can also print it out again for the second (or third time) if you’re feeling stuck or aren’t too concerned with wasting paper.

Read it aloud

Read it aloud to either another person or yourself if there’s no one around.

This will help you pick up on bits of phrasing that seem to read fine but are clumsy and awkward once you try to get your tongue around them.

I whisper it under my breath and play music at the same time to help feel less self-conscious if I’m just reading it to myself. Don’t let your brain lapse back into reading and forgetting to talk if you do this!

I also use the trick of speaking certain phrases aloud if I’m stuck with how to word something, similar to how I do when I pick up my pen and write out a few tricky parts by hand.

Export and Format

Then I export it to HTML and start formatting it inside the place where I’m going to post it.

This is the time to make sure the spacing is correct, any images have alt text, and there isn’t any inconsistency between curly and straight quote marks. (For example, Ulysses doesn’t always change " into “ properly at the start of a quote, but almost always changes it into ” at the end of one.)

If there is a way to ‘preview’ it, I do that a couple of times, switching back and forth to fix up any final typos or formatting that didn’t look as good as I thought it would.

Do a final scan with your favourite grammar analysis tool right before you hit publish.

Ship

Now ship it! This is most important! Do not skip this step! This is the lifeblood that will give you the confidence to complete the next piece of writing instead of having your motivation wilt and die in obscurity. (Like it has for so many of mine!)

Summary

In summary, these are the steps:

• Brain dump notes
• Organise the brain dump
• Write it out by hand
• Type it up
• Briefly edit it
• Print it out
• Scribble on it with a pen
• Type up the pen edits
• Scan it with a grammar analysis tool
• Keep a graveyard of discarded paragraphs
• Make a checklist as you near the finish line
• Read it aloud
• Format and publish

If that is difficult to remember, then just remember the main three steps:

Write it up, print it out, read it aloud.