{"id":4691,"date":"2026-09-07T01:21:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T06:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/?p=4691"},"modified":"2026-08-15T07:34:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T12:34:12","slug":"why-arent-these-posts-longer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/2026\/09\/why-arent-these-posts-longer\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Aren\u2019t These Posts Longer?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">by Dwayne Phillips<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>These blog posts are longer, i.e., don&#8217;t have many words. Sorry, I can&#8217;t help myself.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My blog posts aren&#8217;t very long (see, I could have shortened that sentence by removing the word &#8220;very&#8221; and also the word &#8220;blog.&#8221;). I recently wrote about the <a href=\"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/2026\/07\/the-paramedic-method-of-editing\/\">Paramedic Method of Editing<\/a>. That method helps editors shorten writing, eliminate words, bring clarity, have brevity. I have been using that method without knowing about it. Brevity and clarity were my goals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When writing, I edit before my fingers touch the keyboard. That is a great skill; that is a horrible curse. I edit all the time. I edit my thoughts. I edit your thoughts. I edit your words. I edit your speech while you speak. (You and your refer to anyone else in the room.) I cut, cut, and cut more in the moment. Sometimes, too often, I am not nice. That is the curse portion of this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I read many blog posts. I read many things written by many people in many forums. I marvel at how blog posts are so long. I wonder why I&#8217;m not writing such long posts with so many words. And then I remember that I edit in a harsh and unreasonable manner. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I am stretching this blog post. I am trying to leave the words and not cut, cut, and cut more. I am not doing well at that. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And that is why these posts are not longer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Dwayne Phillips These blog posts are longer, i.e., don&#8217;t have many words. Sorry, I can&#8217;t help myself. My blog posts aren&#8217;t very long (see, I could have shortened that sentence by removing the word &#8220;very&#8221; and also the word &#8220;blog.&#8221;). I recently wrote about the Paramedic Method of Editing. That method helps editors shorten [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,114,113,15,5],"tags":[149,226,225,137,128],"class_list":["post-4691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","category-brevity","category-clarity","category-notebook","category-writing","tag-blog","tag-brevity","tag-clarity","tag-notebook","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4691"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4691\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4692,"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4691\/revisions\/4692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwaynephillips.net\/workingup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}