Wednesdays are my weekly day off, to celebrate summer and spend some QT with my kids. I made some awesome cinnamon sugar muffins and was washing up the mixing bowl when I was struck with this thought: Editing is a lot like washing dishes. Think that’s a stretch? Really, it isn’t.
Think of your first draft as a mixing bowl that’s covered with muffin batter slime. Sure, it’s still a metal mixing bowl, but it’s far from useful. You wouldn’t mix anything else in it when it’s still that dirty. It’s the same principle with the first draft of your written material, whether it’s a book, a press release, an article, or a blog post.
So back to the mixing bowl analogy: You fill up your sink with tons of soapy bubbles and let it soak, you scrub away the grime and your bubbles disappear. It’s much cleaner, but not clean enough to use again. That’s your second draft.
Then, you drain that water and fill it up with fresh soapy water and lightly scrub it again. It doesn’t take you as long this time, and it doesn’t look vastly different from your first wash (or edit), but when you’re done, your mixing bowl is sparkling.
Think of your writing as that mixing bowl. Don’t ever be satisfied with a first draft. You need to scrub it hard (edit), drain the water (let it sit), and wash it again (do a final proofread). It’s not redundant effort, you need to self edit your writing. If you don’t know how, your writing will give the same impression to your prospects and clients that a mixing bowl that still has gobs of batter on the side. It’s a turn-off.
If you need help self-editing your writing, consider my book, Write It Right: The Ground Rules for Self-Editing Like the Pros. It takes you through an easy 10-step formula to improving your writing.