Editing

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Steal my tool to build a consistent, deliberate writing habit.

When I started writing, it felt painful. I didn’t know how to write introductions and struggled to express my ideas. I thought my texts sounded trite (which they did), and I knew I was not as effective as I could be.

I almost stopped writing altogether.

Fast forward, and I’ve built a consistent writing habit and reached more than two million readers through my articles and newsletters.

If I had to name one tool that has kept me going and improved my writing it’s the meta log. It will support you in establishing a deliberate, consistent writing practice that will turn you into a better writer.

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The Science Behind the Meta Log

I invented the tool out of necessity and only recently understood why it works. The meta log is rooted in metacognition. It’s a skill essential for learning, according to many educational scientists.

Different studies show high performers have better metacognitive skills than low performers across various disciplines. Educational psychologist Schraw writes:

“Metacognition is essential to successful learning because it enables individuals to manage their cognitive skills better and to determine weaknesses that can be corrected by constructing new cognitive skills.”

But what is metacognition?

In essence, it means noticing and understanding the way you think. It’s thinking about thinking, knowing about knowing, or becoming aware of your awareness.

When it comes to learning, educational scientists say: “It refers to the processes used to plan, monitor, and assess one’s understanding and performance.”

Here’s a visual explanation:

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“The best performers observe themselves closely. They are in effect able to step outside themselves, monitor what is happening in their own minds, and ask how it’s going.”

— Geoff Clovin

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How to Quickly Set Up Your Meta Log

According to research, three steps are necessary for unlocking your metacognition: planning, monitoring, and evaluating.

Before you start writing, plan. You first think about your desired goal and consider how you’ll use your time.

Second, you can use self-monitoring to remain aware of your progress. You question the steps you take and reevaluate whether you’re following your planned path.

Finally, you want to reflect on your performance. You evaluate what went well and what you can do better next time you sit down to write.

To integrate this into your writing habit, all you need is a journal or spreadsheet with four columns.

1. The first column is for the date.
2. The second column is for the duration of writing.
3. The third column is for planning and self-monitoring.
4. The fourth column is for evaluation.

When you fill out the columns before and after your writing practice, you use your experience to regulate and improve future learning behavior. You self-monitor and self-regulate. Thereby, you steepen the learning curve towards your desired goals.

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The 3 Principles to Make the Most of It

This meta log is a variation of learning journals, which have been proven to enhance meta-cognition.

“However, how the learning journal is used seems to be critical and good instructions are crucial; subjects who simply summarise their learning activity benefit less from the intervention than subjects who reflect about their knowledge, learning, and learning goals,” this meta-analysis in Nature concludes.

To make this practice effective, keep these three principles in mind.

1) Fill the blanks without a reader in mind.

Contrary to your articles, you don’t write for any reader. The meta log is for you. Don’t obsess over word choice. Nobody will ever read it, and it’s only there for you. The more honest you are with yourself, the more helpful it’ll be.

2) Use it every time you write.

Unused tools are useless. The meta-analysis in Nature says the longer you stick with a learning journal, the more effective it is. Strong effects have been observed among students in the context of writing.

Make it a habit to finish your writing with an entry in your meta log. Specify the next step for tomorrow.

3) Bold your key insights.

At the end of a month, go through your meta log and bold your key learnings. That way, you’ll have an easy time revisiting the critical lessons from the past and bring them back to your mind.

Here’s how my meta log from April 2020. I still keep coming back to the highlights once in a while.

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In Conclusion

If you want to become a great writer, consistency matters most.

The meta log keeps you motivated, shows your progress, and helps you move in the right direction. This tool will help you be more effective by including metacognition in your writing process.

Are you ready to set it up?

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I’m building a course on how to write online based on evidence-based practices to make the most of your time. You won’t sit in front of pre-recorded videos and struggle to stick with them. If you’re interested in joining a group of 25 people, you can pre-register here.

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A guide from one of the greatest authors.

For the last 12 months, I’ve been absorbing advice from world-class writers.

One of the most useful books I read is Stephen King’s On Writing. He describes his writing journey and applicable lessons he learned along the way.

To date, King published 62 novels and is among the richest authors of our time. Here are his best tips.

1. You can learn only by doing

“You don’t need writing classes or seminars any more than you need this or any other book on writing. […] You learn best by reading a lot and writing a lot, and the most valuable lessons of all are the ones you teach yourself.”

— Stephen King

Every successful writer follows a writing schedule. King writes every morning. But the time doesn’t matter. What matters is that you sit down and write.

I read his book, searching for a secret sauce. But there’s none. If his success teaches us one thing, it’s that there are no shortcuts. You have to read a lot and write a lot.

2. Use rejections as resilience practice

“By the time I was fourteen (…) the nail in my wall would no longer support the weight of the rejection slips impaled upon it. I replaced the nail with a spike and went on writing.”

— Stephen King

As a young boy, King put the nail in his wall to collect the publisher’s rejection slips. But he didn’t look at it and feel discouraged. Instead, he used these slips as reminders for trying harder.

We all face rejection and failure. What differentiates the mediocre from the most successful writers is they never stop. Rejections don’t matter. But our reaction does.

Whenever you read a publisher’s ‘no,’ remember young King. Persistence ultimately pays off.

3. You should be the only person to judge your work

“I kept hearing Miss Hisler asking why I wanted to waste my talent, why I wanted to waste my time, why I wanted to write junk!”

— Stephen King

A movie inspired King to write his first commercial stories. After a cinema visit, he summarized the thriller on paper. He then printed the story and sold copies at his school. Another time, he wrote some not-so-kind words about one of his teachers for the school paper.

Both times teachers denounced his writing. They asked him to stop. When he didn’t, they sent him to work for a journal. King’s first paying job as a writer was the sports paper for a small-town.

Based on the teacher’s words, he depreciated writing horror stories. He thought of them as something serious people don’t do. Yet, he trusted his instincts and continued. If King followed his educator’s advice, he would have never become a world-class author.

Don’t stop because other people tell you to quit. There’s only one person who should choose what to do — you.

4. Treasure your relationships

“Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference. They don’t have to make speeches. Just believing is usually enough.”

— Stephen King

Carrie is King’s first published novel. But when he wrote the first pages, he didn’t like what he saw and tossed them into the bin. His wife found the pages. She was curious how the story of the 16-year-old girl with telepathic power would continue and urged King to continue.

Your loved ones believe in you when you fail to believe in yourself. Relationships provide crucial mental support for writers.

5. Master the art of deep work

“There should be no telephone in your writing room, certainly no TV or videogames for you to fool around with. Eliminate every possible distraction.”

— Stephen King

Cal Newport wasn’t born when King published his first novels. But likely, King’s work routine served as inspiration for ‘Deep Work.’

He creates a distraction-free environment. He banned his telephone, TV, videogames, and even YouTube from his writing space. That’s how King writes 2,000 words a day. He creates a 180,00 words novel in three-months.

If you get three focused hours of uninterrupted creation time, you solve most of your time management issues. Because once you’re in deep work and focus for an extended period, you immerse yourself in the activity in front of you.

When I write an article with LinkedIn open and my phone within reach, it takes me 5–6 hours. When I’m undistracted, I finish in 2–3. The equation is as follows:

High-Quality Work Produced = (Time Spent) x (Intensity of Focus)

6. Diffused thinking is as important as focused thinking

“Pow! Two unrelated ideas, adolescent cruelty and telekinesis, came together, and I had an idea.”

— Stephen King

To tackle any large task, our brains use the diffuse and focused mode. They have different purposes and to do your best work you need both of them.

We often optimize our days for focused mode thinking, for example, through deep work, flow states, and other highly productive sessions. Much of the learning process happens in this focused mode of thinking.

Yet, the diffuse mode is equally valuable. It only occurs when our minds can wander, e.g., during taking a shower or going for a lonely walk. Without actively thinking, our subconsciousness works on problems. While we feel like taking breaks, our mind continues to work for us.

King shares that the best novel ideas occurred to him while showering, driving, and taking his daily walk. Give your mind regular breaks. Your creativity will thank you for it.

7. 2nd Draft = 1st Draft — 10%

“The shorter the book, the less the bullshit.”

— Stephen King

On one of his rejection slips, an editor gave him invaluable advice. He wrote to him: “You need to revise for length. Formula: 2nd Draft = 1st Draft — 10%.” Here are some easy fixes for how to do it:

• Replace adverbs with stronger verbs: The women said silently. → The women whispered.
• Delete unnecessary “that’s” whenever you can. He feared that his brother loved the sandwich. → He feared his brother loved the sandwich.
• Exchange nouns for verbs: He made the decision to meditate daily. → He decided to meditate daily.

Kill needless words and shorten long phrases. Or, as King says: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.”

8. Use the first words that come to your mind

“One of the really bad things you can do to your writing is to dress up the vocabulary, looking for long words.”

— Stephen King

It’s tempting to dress up your vocabulary. But when we try too hard, our writing becomes unnatural. It might even feel unrelatable.

Don’t disguise your language. Don’t obsess over the thesaurus for unnecessary fluff. The first word that comes to your mind is most often also the best one.

The best writers I know don’t try to sound intelligent. They use simple words in powerful ways. Whenever you catch yourself searching for ‘professional’ words, stop. Instead, use the vocabulary that first comes to your mind.

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A simple tool for producing clear, dense, and solid writing.

The first draft of anything is always shit, Hemingway used to say. And as a writer, your own experience will attest to the quote’s truth.

You know you need to be a merciless editor to get the best out of your articles. To seduce your readers, you need to distill the quintessence of your writing.

Yet, most of us are lousy editors. We’d rather clinch to the clutter in our pieces than deleting parts of our creations.

Humans avoid pain, so it’s natural we desist editing. It hurts. Deleting the words you carefully put on the paper feels like cycling backward.

There are two options to ease the ache. You‘re either fortunate enough to afford an editor or using a leftover graveyard.

I used the latter for my past 39 Medium articles. 35 were curated and resulted in over $4k Medium Partner Program income in August alone.

And as I feel much of the article’s performance is attributed to my leftover graveyard, I want to share this simple tool with you.

In the following lines, you’ll learn what it is and how you can set up your own.

What is a Leftover Graveyard

A leftover graveyard is a fancy name for a simple text document. It’s an archive containing every phrase that wasn’t good enough to remain in your piece but was too beautiful to be deleted.

A leftover graveyard’s sole purpose is to store all words and sentences you’re hesitant to delete. You cut out all fluff from your original piece and bury it in your graveyard. You’ll remove all the clutter as all your semi-rare sentences move to the document. Thereby, your leftover graveyard will make your writing more clear, dense, and solid.

It’s a psychological trick. You delete your words without deleting them forever. In case you miss your words or want to reuse them for other articles, you know where to find them.

I started with one big graveyard, but as I love to scroll through the graveyard’s to find inspiration, I split them into three different ones. I have one for business, one for love, and one for education.

How to Set Up A Leftover Graveyard

You don’t need any fancy tools to make your own one. All you need is a simple text document. I use a google sheet because the cloud makes it accessible from anywhere.

Here’s how my business graveyard looks from inside the document. You see sentence fragments that I cut off from writing a piece on spending less time on your phone.

Once you have the document set up, you’re ready to use it for your editing process.

How to Use It to Edit without Mercy

Your editing graveyard will fill with your first round of editing. That’s when you’ll start to burry your words. Every time you go over a written piece to improve it, open your leftover graveyard.

With every passage, ask yourself: Does this add value for the reader?

If the answer is yes, keep what you wrote. If the answer is nay, move sections or words to your graveyard. Every time you doubt whether you should delete a sentence, cut the sentence out, and paste it into your leftover document.

In case you miss the cutout part, you’ll be able to copy it back to your text anytime. When you feel something should be added, revisit your graveyard and take back sentences that add value for your readers.

Moreover, you can use this graveyard as inspiration when you’re crafting a new piece. I love to scroll through my leftover graveyard from time to add article ideas to my Trello board or to reuse sentence structures I haven’t used so far.

Final Words

Excellent writing requires ruthless editing. Using a leftover graveyard has helped me to make a full-time income from my writing. If that’s your goal, I hope this simple trick does the same for you.

By editing with a leftover graveyard, you’ll have the quintessence left. Your readers will want to read your articles until the end. Your writing, your rules. Use whatever works for you. Ultimately, you determine which process elevates your written words.

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