Writing FAST - Jeff Bollow 2012
The fine print
Quicken and polish
Tweak
At last. You made it.
The final step in the FAST System. The last action of the Tweak phase. You’re almost there!
In this chapter, you’ll zoom in even further, to make sure every word is as crisp and dynamic as you can make it.
And then you’ll apply your Speed Plan, and watch your writing go through the roof!
Sure, you’ve still got work to do. But you’re coming into the home stretch now. It’s exciting, isn’t it?
Use that energy to push you through the last section.
I want you to notice something — notice how you got here. The FAST System separated each job into its own designated task. And instead of trying to do everything at once, you were able to push through each phase at a time, and get words written.
That’s a massive discovery.
See, when you know you’ve got the Tweak phase waiting for you, you allow yourself to let go. Your brain suddenly starts working together. In harmony. Left meets Right, they shake hands, and there is peace in the Factory.
And you can finally complete the projects you start.
So do it. Push that little bit further and finish it. I know you’re anxious. We all get a little scared because “completion” means exposing ourselves to criticism.
But don’t worry. We’ve got one more level of detail to look at before we’re done. One more level to Tweak.
The fine print
The final step of the Tweak phase is making sure every word works, and is up to speed. New writers underestimate the importance of this stuff. Seasoned writers overestimate it.
The truth is somewhere in the middle.
Fact is, your writing is a reflection of you. And readers — especially of professionally-written material (like books, magazine articles, screenplays) — expect a certain level of quality.
If you don’t meet it, they don’t trust what you have to say.
Think about it. If some guy told you he was a professional athlete, and then you saw him huffing and puffing as he climbed a hill, would you believe him? Of course not!
Even if you’re not writing professionally, your words are a measure of how well-spoken you are. If it’s filled with technical mistakes — spelling errors, grammatical mistakes, and obvious “thought” errors — you don’t think, Wow, this guy’s a bad writer. No. You think, Jeez, is this guy stupid?!
It’s not always fair. I’ve seen intelligent and well-spoken writers whose ideas are brilliant. Their writing is bold and dramatic. But their spelling is terrible, the punctuation is all over the place, and as a result, they can’t get their work read.
Demand perfection. Don’t send anything out before it’s ready. Word choice and writing style can be forgiven, as part of your unique voice. But mistakes are the mark of an amateur.
(And on a sidenote: If you notice any typos or errors in this book, send me an email. If you’re the first to point it out, you’ll get a free gift.)
Before you send anything out, do a “Sentence-Level Tweak.”
Inspect every single sentence to make sure it’s flawless.