I've written about 17 or so articles for this Ship 30 experiment so far.

Good quantity, but quality-wise, I hated most of it.

So, I did zero writing this past weekend and meditate on how to fix it.

While having coffee, it suddenly dawned on me I was telling too much and not showing enough in my writing.

So, the obvious solution is "Show, Don't Tell", right? Not quite.

That very same night, I came across excellent Nicky Case's Youtube on, "How To Explain Things Real Good" which gave me 5 better tips than "Show, Don't Tell".

Tip 1: Show What Made You Care

Nicky's point is that most explanations are, "Tell People Why They Might Care".

And that leads to abstract writing and requires second-guessing the audience.

Instead, she recommends to "Show People What Made You Care" which results in more concrete writing and not second-guessing audience.

As an example, she spoke of her not caring about group theory until one day she encountered a question about why mirrors always flip a left-and-right and not up-and-down.

Which is an excellent example of "Show".

Tip 2: Show Then Tell

Nicky wasn't done with "Show" related tricks.

Her second tip of altering "Show, Don't Tell" to "Show Then Tell" is what motivated me to write this.

Because the non-fiction writing I do like follows "Show Then Tell" more closely than "Show, Don't Tell".

Tip within the tip: Use PEA for the Show part -- Pictures, Examples, Analogy.

Tip 3: Therefore, But

I've heard about "therefore, but" before from a book called "Narrative is Everything" by Randy Olson.

Essentially, "But" is about problem which creates tension. "Therefore" is resolving that problem which in turn leads to a new "But". And on and on it goes.

Though I learned before, I didn't apply it much in my past 17 articles.

Nicky reminded me of this trick again, so I've resolved to apply this more in future.

See what I just did? 😉

Tip 4: Write a Draft Then Cut 10%

Count the number of words in first draft. Then cut 10%.

The first draft of this was 385 words. Now it's 447.

So, I've definitely failed at this. 🙁

Tip 5: Test Early and Often

The final tip speaks to me as a software developer.

In writing, Test Early means as early as showing people just the outline.

Then, Often means iterating based on critical feedback on it and future drafts.

I'll start by asking fellow ship 30-ers to be my beta testers for outlines at least.

Go Watch the Full Talk

Don't settle for my summary. Go watch the original talk. It's really good.

Instead of being half-assed practicing all 5 tips, I will concentrate on 3, 1, and, 4 in that order for the rest of Ship 30.

What tip stands out for you the most? Tell me in the Twitter comments.