Writing

My favorite writing trick is to only write my introduction then ask friends who represent my audience this question:

"After reading only this intro, what are the most interesting ideas I could possibly cover in the rest of the post?"

I pick and choose the responses that resonate with me. This is how I de-risk my post from lacking novelty: Am I headed... See more

In short, your first draft is to extract novel ideas out of your brain. Your second draft is to rewrite those ideas so they resonate.

Succinctness—a lack of bloat—helps readers finish your post. What I've learned from asking a lot of friends for feedback is that readers often quit not because they dislike your ideas, but because they're bored.

Succinctness is a ratio. It's the percentage of significant thoughts out of all the thoughts communicated. A post can be 50,000 words, but ... See more

To uncover interesting ideas, continuously make yournext point whatever interests you most. Skip everything that bores you.

When something bores you, it probably bores your readers too. And if something entertains you, it probably entertains them too. You're a proxy for your die-hard readers.

That’s the irony of self-indulgent writing: writing for y... See more

You only fully understand the context of a sentence when you're done reading it. So, the longer the sentence, the more details you hold in your head at once. That makes understanding already complex points even harder.

Clarity and succinctness help ideas resonate. They reduce mental overhead so your ideas pop.

But what gets people reading in the first place? Intrigue , which is the other quality we rewrite for .

Step one is choosing an objective for your post, such as:

1. Open people’s eyes by proving the status quo wrong. Example.


2. Share a solution to a tough problem. Example.


3. Distill an overwhelming topic into something approachable. Example.


4. Tell a suspenseful and emotional story that imparts a lesson. Example.


5. Articulate something everyone’s thinking about but

... See more

One trick for getting yourself to write is to only write sections that immediately interest you. Perhaps it's the middle of a post—that's okay. You don't have to write in order.

Sit down and write any three paragraphs you can. And do it fast. You'll find that by forcing yourself to start with speed, momentum carries you forward.

I like to write sentences that a thirteen-year-old could follow.

If they can understand, so can everyone else—including anyone who's skimming.