Josh's Blog

Category: The Craft of Writing

  • Rewrite

    If it’s even remotely important, rewrite it before you send it. Rewrites are almost always better than the original. Josh

  • Paragraphs: A Short Musing On a Lost Art

    Many people could dramatically improve their writing simply by breaking their posts into paragraphs even without changing any of their words. It’s much more likely that someone would read five paragraphs then one continuous wall of text. Josh

  • How To Make It Shorter

    How To Make It Shorter

    Have you ever struggled with how to make a piece of writing shorter? Maybe you’re writing a speech, a paper, or a song. It’s just too long and you don’t know what to do. Do this: Set aside an hour. Figure out how much you need to cut (300 words, 3 pages, etc). We’ll call…

  • Batch Tasks to Increase Performance and Conserve Energy

    Batch Tasks to Increase Performance and Conserve Energy

    I was recently watching a Thomas Frank video where he was talking about batching tasks to save time and energy. The concept is simple: You take tasks that are similar and do them all at once. He uses the example of how he batches his high energy tasks earlier in the day when he has…

  • Learning Skills Quickly: One Habit at a Time

    Learning Skills Quickly: One Habit at a Time

    One Thing at a Time Learning skills quickly is the process of mastering new habits. In my last year of speech competition, I decided to focus on developing my speaking skills. I grabbed a few of my friends who were exceptional speakers and had them listen to my speech. When I was done, they gave…

  • Reading With Purpose

    The difference between reading and studying a book is not always obvious. We can learn a lot of good information while reading a book only to forget it a few days later. Studying allows us to both read and apply what we learn. I recently listened to a lesson from a writing program I’m in…

  • “I don’t know what to write”.

    “I don’t know what to write”. That’s what we say, we call it “writer’s block”. Seth Godin says that when we say we don’t know what to write what we really mean by that is that we don’t think we can write something good. So we settle for nothing. He advocates for a different approach.…

  • Don’t Take a Break.

    Don’t Take a Break.

    Don’t Take a Break. Have you ever gotten burnt out on something, taken a break, and the break ends up being a lot longer than you’d planned? Maybe several months instead of one week? If you want to keep the skill, don’t take a break. Downsize your goal. Make it small. James Clear recommends that…

  • Daily Tidbits

    I am going to write at least a paragraph every day like Seth Godin does on his blog. It’s a good way to create and ship creative work every day without a large time commitment. That will likely be the subject of my next tidbit. I won’t be caring as much about quality with these…

  • I’m Back.

    I’m Back.

    I stopped blogging towards the end of the year when I had COVID and a final to do. I didn’t get back on the horse. I wrote an about page for this blog, but that’s about it. I’ve been thinking like a classic perfectionist. I’ve been thinking, “I can’t write or post this yet because…