My most common first-draft mistakes

I’ve recently been through a stretch where I wrote more fundraising copy at a faster clip than usual. I started to notice some patterns in my first drafts. Here are some of my common ones, by no means a complete list, but the ones that grabbed my attention:

• Too many details in stories. When you write a story, you’re typically working from your own (or someone else’s) interview notes, a transcript, or an audio or video recording. Typically these sources are rich in details. Rich, powerful stories that move people to action have a lot of details. But not too many. Common writing advice is: Kill your darlings — get rid of those parts you especially like. That’s good advice, especially in your storytelling.
• Things in parentheses that don’t belong in parentheses. Oh man. Almost every other sentence in my first draft is or includes parentheses. I’m not sure why I do this; maybe I’m not confident it belongs and so I downplay it. Most of these can be removed — either the parenthesis marks or the entire content of the parenthesis. And with little or no additional revision.
• Paragraphs all the same length. We try to avoid copy that’s a gray wall of type by writing short paragraphs. What we might not realize is that a page that’s entirely three-line paragraphs is also a gray wall of type. I always include to have a step in my writing where I join some paragraphs, cut apart others, and edit stuff out that I don’t really need.
• Bone-headed spelling errors. I’m a former English teacher, but I’m not a great speller. I use the wrong there/their/they’re. I know the difference; I just type the wrong one sometimes. I recently used the word sore when I meant soar. You can imagine how that changed the meaning of a sentence. Ouch.

What should I do about these errors?

Just one thing: Fix them. Eventually. Before I send them out.

That’s all. I don’t need some kind of re-programming or punishment.

Because getting things wrong in your first draft is normal. It’s inevitable. In a way, it’s even good, because it means you have a first draft that you can make better.

You probably make mistakes like these too. Don’t beat yourself up. Let it be.

Just make sure you fix them before you publish.