How to Edit Yourself

Photo by Burak The Weekender from Pexels

8 steps to achieve impactful brevity:

1. Take a step back and view your work with a detached attitude.

2. Develop a critic’s eye and be ruthless. Figure out why you feel insecure about various aspects of the work – is it because you need to get over it and be more confident, or because you can improve it? 

3. Delete stuff that just doesn’t hit. You’ll know it when it does hit.

4. Delete more stuff.

5. Walk away for a little bit and forget about the editing.

6. Come back to it and see what else needs to get deleted or improved.

7. Improve the parts that aren’t good enough.

8. Repeat!