Why a Freelance Editor Was a Gamechanger for My Blog
mtlynch.io
mtlynch.io
- did you learn or research writing before blogging? - how did you overcome bad writing patterns identified by your editor? - Actually, did you overcome them or do you constantly battle them?
>did you learn or research writing before blogging?
Just in school/college. I also took the free Stanford course "Writing in the Sciences," which I found very helpful for technical writing:
https://online.stanford.edu/courses/som-y0010-writing-scienc...
After working with my editor, I read The Elements of Style (aka "Strunk & White") and found it to be helpful at making my writing more concise and clear.
>how did you overcome bad writing patterns identified by your editor?
I started a checklist for repeated patterns. At the last stage of editing, I'd run through the checklist to check if I was repeating any anti-patterns.
Some of them became automatic after 2-3 more posts. With other mistakes, I don't notice I'm making them until I specifically do an editing pass for them. For example, I tend to overuse weak words like "very" or "really," and I often don't notice until I scan for them.