I’m a slow writer. I also read slowly, speak slowly, and generally process information—what’s the word?—slowly. This has nothing to do with my great age; I’ve been this way since the Nixon era. And maybe it’s not fair to say I’m slow. Let’s say deliberate—the trait of an introvert. (See Susan Cain’s Quiet or this article in Time.) Deliberation takes time. Thoughts just take the scenic route through my brain, is all.

 

The good news is that writing benefits from deep immersion. I have the patience—even the need—to sit with a piece for months on end, recasting it until I’ve crafted something I can be proud of. It’s the only way, as far as I know, to achieve that layered storytelling I’m after. I even sometimes succeed.

 

(Quick side note: I highly recommend taking seven minutes and two seconds to watch George Saunders talk about how restlessness and compulsive revision can lead to better, more empathetic storytelling: George Saunders: On Story.)

 

But there’s a dark side to immersion. Combined with my compulsion to revise (exacerbated by a quarter century of copyediting), immersion becomes a liability. I won’t get two steps into a first draft before I start reworking things at the expense of just getting black on white. This tendency to immediately start crafting makes it difficult to finish a draft. Left unchecked, it can also evolve into an unproductive self-judgment, and you’ll seize up, maybe even stop writing for two decades or so. Just, you know, hypothetically.

 

At any rate, I’m not prolific. For the most part, I’m fine with that. But am I stuck with it? Is it really that hard to find a balance between drafting and revision? Can’t I teach myself to switch back and forth?

 

This backwards bicycle video is somehow both discouraging and inspiring. The upshot: With a lot of hard work, you can retrain yourself to ride a bike that’s rigged to turn in the direction opposite from where you steer it. You can, in other words, retrain yourself even on the most ingrained behaviors. Once you’re retrained, it may take some time to switch back again. But it can be done.

 

So there’s the rub: switching from one mode to the other. It is, by itself, a skill. I already know how to draft and sure as hell know how to revise. So I’ve resolved to be more mindful of where I am in the process. Granted, it’s usually a mixture of drafting and crafting, but if I drift too far one way or the other, I’ll do my best to steer it back in the right direction.