Whatever your politics:
It’s impossible to deny Barack Obama’s communication prowess. He’s a master storyteller, and as fine a writer as they come.
In the preface of his memoir, A Promised Land, Obama shares how he writes first drafts:
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“I only write longhand,” he explains, “computer word processors give the first draft too much polish, and more opportunity to make half baked ideas tidy enough to appear passable.”
When I read this, it felt familiar.
I recognized the sentiment, though I’d never fully acknowledged it in my own process:
I don’t write longhand (my hand cramps) but I write on my phone a lot, using one finger, pecking. In fact, almost every idea, note, and yes, first draft I've ever produced for VeryGoodCopy have been written on my phone, in a Google doc, pecking away, slow and steady, peck—peck—peck.
Writing this way — with a self-imposed physical restriction — forces me to be thoughtful and intentional and rational about every word, every punctuation mark, everything I put down. When I’m on my phone, the idea is expressed slowly, methodically, unlike when I’m typing on a keyboard at 60 words per minute and everything is suddenly there and seemingly right.
Writing slow is thinking slow, which, according to Nobel Prize winner, Daniel Kahneman, is how we should be thinking if we want clear, coherent thoughts.
And what’s good copy if it’s not clear and coherent?
To write well, try writing slow.
And to write slow, create bottlenecks between your thoughts and the words you put on the page, especially when writing a first draft:
Write longhand.
Write with one finger.
Write with physical restrictions.
Write, slow.
Go on.
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