Write first, research second
There are 1,000+ biographies of Winston Churchill—innovate then imitate
Grow your audience on public platforms (twitter), build relationships on private platforms (email)
Read to collect the dots, write to connect the dots
Test your ideas with people in conversations and on twitter
Vary the length of your sentences. Have some short and some long.
Write from abundance, write from conversation, write in public
Last week, I wrote about how Warren Buffett addresses the early drafts of his shareholder letters to his sister, Dorothy. Once he’s done writing it, he replaces her name with “Shareholders.” He does this because writing for a huge audience increases the chance of getting writer’s block. But the task becomes easier when he writes for one person instead.
It’s like walking on a sidewalk. People who are paying attention don’t fall off sidewalks. Walking on a sidewalk is so easy in fact that you don’t even think about it. But if you put that same sidewalk 100 feet in the air, you’d start freaking out. Your heart would be racing and your palms would be sweatier than a college kid in their first job interview. Just by changing the context, you’ve turned something easy into something anxiety-inducing.
Writing is the same way. It’s not that hard. What’s hard is knowing an audience is going to read what you’re writing and critique your ideas. That’s why my students can pen brilliant emails when they write directly to somebody they trust but freak out when it’s time to write in public.