Write Less To Write Best

The days of the classic writers are gone. It is no longer acceptable to use 10 adjectives to describe every noun, as Dickens or Melville once did. (But can you blame them? If I were paid by the word, I'd describe the heck out of everything, too.)

More Is Not Better
The goal of writing is to convey a message. People -- especially people on the internet -- are becoming increasingly impatient, so you must convey your message quickly and clearly. And that means using as few words as possible and the best words possible.

As an example, look to your own reading habits. How often do you linger on a web page if all you see is a dense block of text? How much introduction do you tolerate before you demand substance? In the modern age of writing, the rule is clear: don't use 50 words to say what 10 words can.

You can improve your writing immensely by improving your use of description and by eliminating pointless introductory or qualifying phrases.

Fewer (and Better) Details
Your use of detail has a powerful impact on your writing. A writer quickly learns that all words are not equal -- some words are worth five to ten words!

For instance, if I were to send you an invitation to "a party at my house", how much would you know about the party? You'd know only that it exists, right?

But what if I sent you an invitation to "a kegger at my house"? Here I've used the same number of words, but I've communicated a lot more information! You can now make a lot of assumptions about the party. You would expect, for instance, a raucous party filled with booming music and obnoxious revelry. Around midnight, somebody's likely to be dancing on the end table, and the police will be escorting the minors out of the house by 3 A.M. (As an aside, you'd also figure I was joking, since I hate such parties and certainly wouldn't want the responsibility of hosting one.)

In this case, "kegger" is worth several words. By packing specificity into individual words, your writing becomes crisp and interesting without appearing overly descriptive.

Say It Boldly
Timid writing also threatens your message. Too often, needless introductory phrases or qualifiers weaken the message or destroy its clarity.

Consider this sentence: It may surprise you to know it, but I'm able to fly around the room by flapping my arms like a bird.

What purpose does the introductory phrase "It may surprise you to know it" serve? Does it convey any useful information? No! Of course it would surprise you to know it -- flying around the room by flapping your arms just isn't normal. The reader doesn't have to be told that it's surprising, because the statement is surprising in and of itself.

Qualifiers are also dangerous to your message. Consider the sentence, "I normally think that most people are usually pretty nice at times." What's the message in that sentence? Who could know? A bolder statement would be "I think people are generally nice." Bolder still would be "Most people are nice."

If your message is important enough to share with others, it's important enough to share boldly. After all, who would share your opinion if even you are ashamed of it?

The Proper Time and Place
Before you turn to something you've previously written and decimate the word count, remember that there is a proper time and place for details. At all times, you must keep the overall message in mind. Anything you can do to share that message with your reader, do it. But be aware of those things that may get in the way of sharing that message, such as clumsy phrasing or being timid about your message.

In his book, On Writing, Stephen King tells of the best writing advice he received, which I will paraphrase as: trim your first draft by ten percent.

This is fantastic advice. By condensing what you've written, you force out that weak writing that dilutes your message's potency. It also gives you persmission to trust that most of what you've written is actually usable.

As you can see, you are not on the hunt for a smaller word count for its own sake -- you are on the hunt for a smaller word count for the message's sake. By using the message as your guide, you ensure that your writing stays interesting and informative, even while concise.

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The Other Side Of Quitting

As I said in last week's article, any real change in our habits requires a change within ourselves. Quitting smoking, then, isn't about smoking -- it's about ourselves.

The Trouble With Negative Goals
Your ability to visualize the completion of a goal has a powerful effect on your ability to actually succeed at that goal. The theory is that if you can picture something in your mind with great clarity, you are already more than halfway there. It's like the difference between driving to Seattle with a map in your hand and a red line drawn on the roads you will be using versus simply hopping in the car, driving west and hoping for the best.

But what about negative goals? What about those goals where the aim is to not do something, like not wasting money, not eating too much or not smoking?

Negative goals create a unique problem, because they cannot be visualized. Negation is too abstract to visualize. We are engineered to imagine what is and what can be, not what isn't and cannot be. We can imagine light, but what about the absence of light? When we imagine the absence of light, are we not really visualizing darkness? When we visualize a person who is not kind, don't we really just see somebody who is mean?

How then are you to succeed in your goal to quit smoking, if it is impossible to visualize not smoking?

Visualizing Negative Goals
Because of the nature of negative goals, the necessity to change who we are becomes even more evident. In every case, our goal is not actually what we want to give up or end (the negative goal), but is actually what we want to receive or gain as the result of success (a positive goal). We don't want to lose, we want to gain.

This is a subtle difference, but a profound one. A negative goal, in essence, is merely a reflection of the true goal. When we seek to lose weight (a negative goal), we are actually trying to increase our health or improve our appearance (positive goals). When we seek to avoid slouching in business meetings, we are actually trying to improve our professional image and poise.

The Reflection of "Not Smoking"
So, what about smoking? When we seek to quit smoking, we are actually looking to improve our health. I would not have believed it when I was going through the process, but I now know it is surely true. The easiest way to observe this is this: when you visualize healthy living, smoking (among other things) never enters the picture!

As you can imagine, the whole process becomes easier once the negative goal of quitting smoking transforms into its true goal of creating a healthy lifestyle. You then have an easily visualized picture of what "not smoking" looks like: being healthy.

The Road Ahead
In my previous article, I showed how to crack the psychological desire to smoke. That first method, believe me, is effective in and of itself. However, you will notice that it does not do anything to address the true goal of quitting smoking: the goal to develop healthy habits. Because of this, if you do not seek to develop positive habits to replace your negative one, you will find a dull anxiety gnawing at you...and it feels a lot like cravings for a cigarette!

Most people smoke as a means of combating stress. Now that your healthy lifestyle does not include smoking, what will you do? If you do not make plans to build a healthy alternative into your lifestyle, you will surely fall into an unhealthy one!

Visualizing A Positive Future
How do you set the foundation for a brighter, healthier future? The process is much like the one you used to shatter your desire to smoke. But the emotional process is the exact opposite from before, because you will feel fantastic by the end.

This time, though, you will build your own future. As you are visualizing a happier, healthier you, consider these questions:

• In what healthy way will you now handle stress?
• How will your loved ones benefit from your healthy lifestyle?
• How will your energy levels change, and what activities will you now be able to do?
• How will taking an interest in your health impact your self-esteem?
• You've given up smoking...what have you gained?

By the time you are done with this exercise, you will feel like you haven't smoked in ten years, and would never consider doing so again.

Enjoy the new you.

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The Easy Way To Quit Smoking (Without Patches or Gimmicks)

Forget patches, hypnotists and insulting public service announcements. Quitting smoking could be easier than you think. It was for me...

Why Most Methods Don't Work
First of all, let's not kid ourselves. Quitting smoking is obviously not easy, as evidenced by the sheer number of smokers who have quit smoking, only to return to it within days, months or even years.

But the problem isn't that the smoking habit is insurmountable. The problem is that many of the methods for quitting smoking are inadequate. Indeed, all unsuccessful methods share one thing in common: they attempt to change the smoking, and not the smoker!

A Hard Fact About The Easy Way
Albert Einstein once said, The problems that exist in the world cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them. The problem of overcoming smoking is no different. You will be a different person after quitting than you were when you were a smoker.

This is perhaps the most difficult part about quitting smoking, and is the reason behind many failed attempts. You see, smoking is not only a habit, it is an identity. When you tell people that you are a smoker, you aren't merely describing a habit -- you're describing an image! Quitting smoking, then, denies you access to that image. And smoking is an image that, for some people, is too precious to give up.

A Mental Game
Because of this, quitting smoking is very much a mental game, far more than it is a physical one.

Not a physical problem, you might ask? What about cravings, or the agony of withdrawal? Here again, the mind reigns supreme; how can the body ache for what the mind does not crave?

Now, I'm not speaking merely about philosophy or theory. I'm talking about a technique that my own experience proves. I quit cold-turkey, and suffered no withdrawal and no cravings. In fact, I have not even had the slightest interest in smoking ever since.

Such a remarkable turnaround is possible only after the mental game has been won. Once the mental game is won, the physical need to smoke is crushed.

Winning The Mental Game
So, how is the mental game won? It is won through the use of emotive visualization, peering into a dark and hopeless future and seizing the power to change it now.

This method is based on the pleasure/pain principle made popular by Anthony Robbins. The idea is to attach the utmost pain to smoking, and to recognize the pleasure that awaits you in a smoke-free life.

By winning the mental game, withdrawal symptoms simply do not occur. Once you have associated enough pain with the smoking habit, the only time you feel sick is when you think about smoking!

Ultimate Pain
Smokers, contrary to what public service commercials seem to suggest, are not stupid. They know that smoking isn't healthy. But smokers associate enough pleasure with smoking that, psychologically, it simply isn't worth quitting. Employing the ultimate pain principle, however, tips those scales dramatically!

The first step is to build a powerful image in your mind of exactly how painful smoking can and will be to you. Don't skimp on the details, and be sure to be brutally honest. Take the approach of "anything bad that can happen, will happen".

Here's an example of what I visualized:

I imagine that I'm looking in a mirror. This isn't a regular mirror, though. Instead of looking at myself, I am looking at myself 30 years from now. And what I see is ghastly! I am shriveled and frail. I am sitting in a wheelchair and must carry an oxygen tank with me. I can't speak at a normal volume, for any effort to speak brings about a wicked coughing spasm, which then makes it difficult to breathe -- and my regular breathing is labored as it is! I feel an emptyness as I think of the things that I shall never do, like traveling. Not only can I not go to distant lands, but even going to the local grocery store is a herculean effort. I ache with sympathy for the being I see in the mirror, my soul yearns to offer comfort or help. Then, my future self looks at me right in the eye and asks,full of anger -- full of hatred -- why did you do this to me?

If you do this right, you will never smoke again! I say the process is easy, but emotionally it can actually be quite draining. You are essentially subjecting yourself to a lifetime of pain in a very short period of time. But it is certainly worth it!

As I mentioned earlier, permanently quitting smoking literally changes who you are. In my next article, I will show you how to manage the transition from being a smoker to being a non-smoker.

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