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Revu2 · Sep 03, 2024 at 11:48 AM

I'm suck up "tips" articles like bon-bons. Since half of me leans in, and other other half flakes off. The lean in side must keep a step ahead of the flake off side. Never ends.

Found these tips based on the writer's journey as an adult into learning to play the drums and then jazz improvisation.

Jazz lessons for writers
In similar fashion, I made myself draft and send this essay in just a few days, so that I would not talk myself out of doing it. A little clean-up, aka editing and self-editing, came later.

Writing will always be challenging for me, but I’m hoping that “jazz drafts” will continue to instill the process with more confidence, and even some riffs of joy.

Here are some tips, inspired by my jazz journey, for making a first story draft (or other large, complicated task) less daunting:

Incremental. Set a small, specific goal.

Immediate. Give yourself an imminent deadline so you don’t have time to wonder or second-guess or calculate whether you can pull it off.

Accountable. Enlist a friend or coworker to hold you accountable.

Conversation. Real-time dialogue is a form of improv! When you don’t have someone on hand to bounce your ideas off, read your draft aloud and listen to yourself. It’s amazing how quickly rough spots jump out when spoken rather than scrolled.

Habitual. Schedule such conversations on a regular basis, for built-in accountability without requiring “initiation” energy.
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Esther Landhuis (@elandhuis) is a California-based science journalist who covers biomedicine at all stages — lab discoveries, clinical trials, biotech, healthcare and its intersections with law and business.