Anne Lamott’s article, “Shitty First Draft” gave the readers realistic advice. Probably all if not most of us have had moments where we are suppose to write either an essay or research paper and we have writer’s block. Not everyone starts to with a good draft and that’s ok. Lamott tells us that not everyone is satisfied with their first draft even if they work hard on it. There is a process for everyone to get their minds working. Even the professional writers take their time and do their own process to start their writing. As she mentions at the end of her article, “almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something – anything — down on paper,” (para. 10) I think these three sentences summarize her article and it’s a straight-forward idea she gives her readers and I think they should take it.
When it comes to giving in a first draft, I’m someone who works on the first draft two times before I hand it in, almost the same way as Lamott. For me there is a little process I do to begin my writing. For example, if I have to write on a topic or paper, I read what the assignment is asking for carefully to know exactly what I should be writing about. I don’t start to write automatically, I take a few minutes to just think about my response. After I know what I want to write about I always start with what I learned in middle school, to have an introduction, body and a conclusion. After that I want there to be topic and not just have random thoughts jumping everywhere. I feel that this process works better for me because I’m able to then move those ideas that I wrote to different sections. Of course, that isn’t always the case sometimes I don’t know what to write down and I just write sentences that relates to my work. They could be small and little detailed sentences. After I have finished the first draft, I go back and reread my work and focus on what else I can add in or take out. I always find this process helpful because as I’m reading my work, more ideas start to pop up. Although, Lamott states that in the beginning of writing, you will have a shitty draft I do follow her advice that we should just write anything down but at the same time in my own writing process I like to do more than just write down anything, I like to edit my work while I’m still on the first draft to be ready to move on to the next draft. It takes a few drafts to be satisfied with the final piece. As I mentioned before, there is a process everyone has to writing or handing in their first draft.
I think the advice given in this piece is very sound as well. The notion that you have got to just get anything down on paper. Often people will procrastinate the writing, They will open up Word, or open their notebook, and let it sit for a while. Next, they’ll put the date, or the title, or the subject, and let it sit for even longer. Then, the hardest part comes, actually writing something with substance, something you need to use your brain for. I also write structurally, and even on a first draft, I never go in blind, I always have some form of outline or word web to flesh out and base myself off of and it has worked for me thus far.
First drafts are made to be shitty. But I agree with you that the important part is what comes after. Instead of investing so much effort and time into making a well-written paper, it’s important to dish out ideas. Then you would go back and revise, improving and developing ideas. I make the same mistake as you, which is editing while working. It saves time but method makes the writing process more arduous. I feel like writing drafts and then editing after the drafts will be a more effective way to write.