How to Improve Your Writing

I regularly run workshops in which students run the gamut from aspiring beginners to many-books-published career writers. A fun challenge is to design activities and lead discussions that meet the needs of both extreme groups and the majority who lie somewhere in the middle. Most issues with writing and self-editing are similar to gardening — there's always more growth to be coaxed from our beloved plants, and everything depends on the light.

Here's one that's adaptable to every writer, no matter the genre or the skill and experience levels.

One of the most useful shifts you can make as a writer is moving from “I already know this” to “What else can I try with this?” It’s a small change in mindset that swings wide a big door. Even the writing masters haven't mastered writing in the truest sense of the word. In fact, the most accomplished writers I know (and know of) are keenly aware of the need to continue improving, to practice the craft, to evolve.

The more we know in our bones about what makes writing resonate, the farther away our own drafts appear to be from our envisioned ideal.

And let’s be honest: just because you "know this already" doesn’t mean you’ve squeezed all the juice out of it. Frankly, it doesn't mean you're even doing the task you know you need to do!

Staying open means inhabiting curiosity. Especially when you’re self-editing, this attitude makes all the difference. Instead of scanning your draft thinking, “This seems fine,” you start asking more useful questions: Is this doing what I want it to? Could it be doing more? Am I settling for the first version of this idea just because it’s technically working?

You may have a solid grip on what a good description takes. But in revision, the question becomes: Is this description actually revealing something about the character—or is it just a clever turn of phrase that sounded good at the time? (My former writing teacher identified these sentences and passages as prime candidates for the dreaded "slash and burn." Cutting sloppy writing is easy for me, but cutting the truly beautiful, well-written stuff that serves no one and nothing but myself? So. Very. Hard.)

Or maybe it's dialogue. You're confident that what you've written sounds like the way real people actually talk to each other. Great! Now ask: Are these characters honestly saying something meaningful, through the words and the cues, or are they just swapping lines because I needed to move the scene along?

Or the oft-repeated advice to "show don't tell." Yes, yes, you say, I know that already. But perhaps the question for yourself is not “Am I showing?” but “Am I showing the right stuff? In the right way?"

You might also borrow a trick from improv comedy, where no matter what the scene partner says or does, you can't reject it out of hand. Instead of no or don't, either of which shut down the improv immediately, the actors use a “Yes, and…” approach. This doesn't involve the literal words yes and and but is a way of implementing an open-minded "accept and expand" approach.

Actor A: Oh no! Our spaceship crashed!

Actor B: But yay! It's a planet made of cheese!

Actor A, who had a different idea in mind but goes with it: And now the aliens are chasing us with pitchforks for eating their houses!

The Yes, and lens helps you consider what else you might do, what else might be possible.

Revising with this mindset makes the self-editing process much more enjoyable and surprising — especially to yourself.

Tips Galore!