Delete Button: A Writer's Best Friend
Today I submitted the biggest paper I have written for school thus far, the International Baccalaureate extended essay-- 4,000 words, 7 drafts, and 1 chance to get it all right. Needless to say, I've been editing like crazy lately.
Most of the changes are simple. Add a letter here, delete a word there, remove a contraction or two, nothing too complicated. But sometimes it's more serious. Take a sentence, chop it up, and rearrange it. Delete one idea and change it to another.
And then sometimes, you just can't get the words to work. No matter how many times you rearrange and rephrase, it just doesn't seem to help. That's when you have to bite the bullet....
Highlight and... DELETE.
When you don't have the right stuff to work with, sometimes you just have to start from the beginning. CS Lewis phrased it a bit differently, "We all want progress, but if you're on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the write road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive."
Admitting you've been wrong is one of the most humbling and hardest things to do, but it also brings you one step closer to being right. You can't heal until you've owned up to the problem, you can't discovered the truth until you've let go of the lie, and you can't enjoy today until you've let go of the past.
The beauty is that God doesn't ask us to walk the path without stumbling, he just asks us to try. When we admit defeat, we give grace and redemption the freedom to win us over.
The Lord has promised us these things, telling us that when we confess our sins, he will wash us white as snow. That's the agreement: we highlight the sin... and He hits delete.
Most of the changes are simple. Add a letter here, delete a word there, remove a contraction or two, nothing too complicated. But sometimes it's more serious. Take a sentence, chop it up, and rearrange it. Delete one idea and change it to another.
And then sometimes, you just can't get the words to work. No matter how many times you rearrange and rephrase, it just doesn't seem to help. That's when you have to bite the bullet....
Highlight and... DELETE.
When you don't have the right stuff to work with, sometimes you just have to start from the beginning. CS Lewis phrased it a bit differently, "We all want progress, but if you're on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the write road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive."
Admitting you've been wrong is one of the most humbling and hardest things to do, but it also brings you one step closer to being right. You can't heal until you've owned up to the problem, you can't discovered the truth until you've let go of the lie, and you can't enjoy today until you've let go of the past.
The beauty is that God doesn't ask us to walk the path without stumbling, he just asks us to try. When we admit defeat, we give grace and redemption the freedom to win us over.
The Lord has promised us these things, telling us that when we confess our sins, he will wash us white as snow. That's the agreement: we highlight the sin... and He hits delete.
Hey, Jessica. It's Deborah, from CRAM.
ReplyDeleteFirst off, I love your blog. Posting once a day is an impressive accomplishment, and you do it with grace.
I also have a blog, about teens who set and accomplish goals. I was wondering if you'd consider doing an interview on my blog about your goal, what made you set it, what the experience has been like, any suggestions you have for others with similar goals.
Lastly, would you like to be nominated for the Liebster Award? It's an award bloggers give to each other to get to know one another.
Anyway, good luck with the blog. God bless