Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Loving and caring people want to help others. So we put one more thought into the writing and one more statement into the speaking. Delete those.

Here are tips on editing writing that don’t need much thought, but hold true about 98.6% of the time:

• Delete the last word of a phrase
• Delete the last phrase of a sentence
• Delete the last sentence of a paragraph
• Delete the last paragraph of a page
• Delete the last page of a chapter
• Delete the last thing of a bigger thing

Get the idea?

Loving and caring people want to help others. We want to be sure the other person understands, so we add just one more little bit to what we have already conveyed. That extra little bit will help the other person an extra little bit and that will make all the difference.

Sigh. We are our own worst enemies. Brevity often leads to clarity. Delete that extra little bit that we added to make sure the other person understands. The other person understands already. That extra little bit is often more than a little bit, and it doesn’t help.