“Don’t write to sound smart. Write to be useful. If you’re useful over a long time period, you will end up looking smart anyway.”
James Clear
Writing is the art of beaming an idea into someone’s brain. When the signal is weak, the transfer fails.
That’s why it’s essential you make your writing is as clear as possible.
Don’t obscure your ideas in overcomplicated language. Give each idea the best chance of finding a home in your reader’s mind.
To help you with this, here is one thing you can do starting today to add clarity to your writing:
When editing, spend a portion of your time specifically on clarity.
If you only do ‘general’ edits, there’s too much to evaluate. It’s easy to be overwhelmed and miss the basics, such as:
“Does this clearly communicate my idea in a way that my reader will understand — or will they miss what I mean?”
So rather than relying only on broad-stroke editing, make sure you go through each piece with a lens focused on clarity.
With each paragraph, ask: “is this clear?”
The sum total of these changes will make your writing feel crisp and clear.
And most importantly, you will beam your ideas directly into your reader’s brain.
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