EPISODE 7: JUST WRITE: YOUR FIRST DRAFT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE PERFECT

EPISODE 7: JUST WRITE: YOUR FIRST DRAFT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE PERFECT

In this episode, Pamela Samuels Young makes a compelling and liberating case for letting go of perfection and writing anyway. Drawing on her own experience — including two weeks spent obsessively rewriting a chapter that ultimately got cut entirely — she shows listeners exactly what gets in the way of finishing a first draft and how to push through it.

Welcome To Episode 7.

Here's something nobody tells you about first drafts — every single one of them is a mess. Every bestseller you've ever loved started as an imperfect, uneven, sometimes embarrassing first draft. The writers you admire didn't write better first drafts than you. They just kept going.

The biggest threat to your book isn't writer's block. It isn't time. It isn't talent. It's the voice in your head that says what you've written isn't good enough. This episode is about learning how to ignore that voice and write anyway.

The Perfectionism Trap.

Perfectionism is the enemy of the first draft. Full stop. The desire to get every sentence right before moving forward is one of the most common reasons writers never finish their books.

There is no such thing as a perfect first draft. Not yours, not anyone's. The purpose of a first draft is not to be perfect, it's to exist. You cannot edit a blank page.

Anne Lamott, in her beloved book on writing entitled Bird by Bird, has a now-famous chapter that has given more writers permission to keep going than almost anything else ever written about the craft. Her point is simple: every writer writes badly at first. The ones who succeed are the ones who write badly and keep going anyway.

No one will see what you've written until you're ready for them to see it. Give yourself the freedom that comes with that fact. Your first draft is just for you.

Think of Writing Your First Draft as Building a House.

Remember the outline we discussed in Episode 6? That's your skeleton. The bones of your story. Now you're putting meat on those bones. You're not building from nothing. You're filling in a structure that already exists.

Your job in writing your first draft is to get from the beginning to the end. That's it. Not to write perfectly. Just to finish.

A completed, but imperfect first draft is infinitely more valuable than a collection of perfectly written scenes that never add up to a whole book.

I mentioned earlier that during my pantser days, I spent weeks polishing a chapter that was ultimately cut from the book. Weeks of obsessive rewriting, gone in an instant. That experience taught me more about first drafts than any writing book ever could. Get to the end first. Fix it later.

This doesn't mean you won't cut scenes or chapters from your book simply because you outlined first. But the pain of cutting will be considerably reduced since you wrote efficiently from the start. 

Here's Your No-Excuses Challenge for Episode 7.

For this episode, your challenge is simple, but non-negotiable. Write one page. That's approximately 250 words. It's okay that you don't have a completed outline yet. And it doesn't matter where you start. Write the scene that's clearest in your head right now, even if you're not sure where it fits yet in your story. It doesn't have to be perfect, no one else will see it. Just write something. Every word you put down is a word closer to finishing your book.