Last month, I went on vacation to Florida with the family.
We headed down to Key West for a couple of days. Naturally, we passed by Sloppy Joe’s—a bar where author Ernest Hemingway spent almost every night between 1933 and 1937. (Funny thing—I’ve been to bars in three countries where Hemingway used to hang out.) And there, on a t-shirt in the window, was one of my favorite Hemingway quotes:
Write drunk. Edit sober.
Really? Is having a beer or two (or four or five) the secret to great writing?
Nope.
But it does mean that after ingesting of all your research and competition and influences, you should just write. Write uninhibited and simply get the words out on the paper or the screen. Don't edit yourself. Let every idea escape onto the paper. Don’t get bogged down wondering if it makes sense or if you’re using the correct grammar.
Just write without stopping and at the end, you’ll have a spectacularly awful first draft.
Ta-da!
Congratulations—you now have something to work with. It’s so much easier to edit verbiage that’s in front of you than to try and mentally edit text that still only exists in your head.
It's early morning and I'm finishing this up before the day begins. I gave up coffee two weeks ago and I find I'm missing the ritual more than the caffeine. Luckily, one of my former art director partners is now a tea therapist and I'm working my way through I few samples. I fear decaf just might be a gateway drink back to fully leaded.
Where did the summer go? Did you head anywhere fun?
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