How I Draft My Blog Posts

One question I’m often asked is, “did you major in English? Your writing is so good!” I’m always so flattered when I hear that. As a writer, it’s literally the whole point that the reader understand and appreciate your writing. I then inform them that I did not, in fact, major in English. I, instead, majored in the incredibly stuffy discipline of Political Science. Ugh. What was I thinking?! Once I get over that, I tell them the secret to my writing is my process. And today, I want to share the first step of that process with you - drafting.

Step 1: Think on it. I endeavor not to actually do any writing until I’ve thought enough about the post to have a clear idea of its depth and intent. Once I do, I move to step two.

Step 2: Outline. I make a very brief outline. I include just enough to guide me - a beginning, a middle, and an end. There often just a few words too. For example, for this blog post, my outline looked like (I) Intro, (II) Steps, (III) Closing. That’s it.

Step 3: Write. I just dump it all out. I don’t worry about organization, structure, grammar, or punctuation. And I don’t try to fit in the outline. I write it below the outline. Just get it out of my head and onto paper.

Step 4: Step away. I usually give myself anywhere from a couple hours to a couple days to let the writing breathe. This gives me a fresh perspective when I return to it.

That’s it! After that, you have a first draft. And there’s a reason it’s called a “rough draft.” It’s not meant to be pretty or finished. Once that’s done, I edit, proofread, make graphics or take a photo, then post.

Does your draft process look like this? What steps do you include?