I have been writing blogs for almost two years, and each organically emerged from something I experienced, witnessed, or discussed. Each could originate from scribbling on a damp bar napkin or voiced into an Apple watch driving the Lincoln Highway. For every ten unearthed random conjectures, one becomes a completed draft. Those that made it to the status went through iterations of writing, deleting, and complete start-overs. But once the fluidity of the draft felt right, I would copy and paste the text into Grammary.com to check the accuracy of my grammar. It is now time to edit.
Using the Grammarly.com free version to review each blog before sending it into the URL ether, the statistical mean of my performance text score has improved by 15 points since the first paste almost two years ago. Is this a reflection of my grammar enhancement? Maybe I subconsciously learn to appease the grammatical code gods? But during a collection of bourbons the other night with a bit of overconfidence, I pasted what I thought was a strong draft into Grammarly and it returned an initial score of 74. F.U., Grammarly.
Admittedly, I am pro-delete to LinkedIn messages or emails containing obvious unedited errors. These are not necessarily spelling errors or mismatches in the fonts. I am not disgruntled if the messaging has ten spelled out in one area and then references it as 10 in another. However, if I receive an email where someone is promoting their company, technology, or skills and my name is obviously in the wrong position, the message immediately gets ignored. For example, if the message has my name in an intended position where a company name should be and vice versa, the email is sentenced to death through the delete key. "Good afternoon COMPANY. Can I find 10 to 15 minutes of your time to introduce myself and my company's solution to support NAME's objectives?" Yup. Delete.
Bombarded with emails seeking attention, I default to assume these emails come from an individual who solely relies on artificial intelligence before sending. These mistakes are so harsh that it confirms the sender has done no review or edit before sending. Why would you do business with this individual when they do not validate the correct position of names within a message? This type of messaging is a haphazard and lazy paste-and-send approach with no personalized ownership of intent. It is blind acceptance of automation at the expense of grotesque errors.
Individuals claim that Ernest Hemming said, "Write drunk, edit sober.” Multiple articles and biographies challenge the urban legend that he originated this quote, but the intent rings true. To develop sequences of marbles bouncing around in our heads, we can relieve these rambles by working on the draft of our messaging. Whether it is therapeutic via a therapist or a stress-reliever to put these thoughts on paper, we should strive to connect the dots by aerating them first against no headwinds.
From this commitment to transcribe this personal collection of chaos, we may learn the art of unraveling randomness through personalized communications. We can learn how to put down our guards, explore the reasoning behind errors, and find the cardinality of inadvertently placed mental nuggets. We can learn to accept deleting an entire page because it diverted from the message's intent. We can learn to avoid pausing within thought to right-click the word loquacious to check the spelling. Let the crafting flow.
As we apply an ebb and flow to these collections of randomness, we should not slow down the flow. But most importantly, we should never click the send key at conception. Instead, we must transition this collage and organized chaos into a phase of editing. Noting Hemmingway, you edit sober. He does not say, "Write drunk and send." It is mandated to be a 2-step process that does not forgo an edit.
Writing drunk may sound entertaining, but mistakes get made, tempers flare, and even a small slip-up like posting a personal tweet to your company page instead of your page can cause a disaster. - Henry Dvries, Forbes
Editing requires attention to detail and intense consciousness of the intent. It is a sequential step in the creation process and requires practice to establish credibility. Solely relying on the initial pass, not preparing, and being lazy and flippantly selecting the send button gets the message deleted.
Thanks, Grammarly your editing support is appreciated. A 99.
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