Writing and Healing Idea #40: A Clean Copy

In order to practice revision—looking again—it’s necessary, first, to have something to look at. And a good way, I think, to practice this, is to have something written down—some clean unmarked pages of writing.

Thus, I propose, a first step to revision: a clean copy of at least 10 pages of writing.

What kinds of pages? Anything. It can be pages from a journal. Pages you wrote in response to a writing idea. It can be a story. It can be pages of freewriting. Anything. Anything you feel like you’d like to look at again. Really. And if you don’t have any pages you want to look at again—–you can create some new pages.

You can, if you like, begin by freewriting.

If your pages are handwritten pages, it’s probably best to enter them into your computer and print them out. It’s easier, I think, to see words and sentences when they’re typed and have spaces between and around them.

The goal is (at least) 10 freshly printed, unmarked pages of your own writing.

And then find a folder for the pages and put them away for a while—for a week at least—