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Before we revise, we need something to revise. We must compose the perfect first draft.\n\n\n\nHow?\n\n\n\nWe write without worrying about every comma splice or misplaced modifier. We write with abandon and get the story down.\n\n\n\nThe Writer Hat\n\n\n\nDuring the prewriting and creation stage, we must consciously separate the writer self from the editor self. It\u2019s as if we need to wear two hats\u2014literally two different hats you can wear at the appropriate times. In episode 91, I mentioned my literal editor hat: a Maxwell Perkins-style fedora.\n\n\n\nThe writer hat\u2014especially needed during that first draft creation stage\u2014is more like a baseball hat popped on backward. That image comes to me from Barbara Kingsolver, who wrote:\n\n\n\n\nMy muse wears a baseball cap, backward. The minute my daughter is on the school bus, he saunters up behind me with a bat slung over his shoulder and says oh so directly, \u201cOkay, author lady, you\u2019ve got six hours till that bus rolls back up the drive. You can sit down and write, now, or you can think about looking for a day job.\u201d (High Tide in Tucson, 96)\n\n\n\n\nDon\u2019t stop the momentum and start fiddling with the words when knocking out that draft. Pop on the baseball cap as a reminder to keep the words flowing.\n\n\n\nWhen that hat is on, we\u2019re in a no-judgment zone, building the piece, keeping the creativity flowing, not second-guessing ourselves. Just get \u2018er down and git \u2018er done.\n\n\n\n\u201cCrummy\u201d First Drafts\n\n\n\nAnother memorable source to turn to regarding first drafts is Anne Lamott. Countless writers have found freedom to write wild and free and without judgment thanks to a chapter in Bird by Bird (and I paraphrase), \u201cCrummy First Drafts.\u201d\n\n\n\n\u201cAll good writers write them,\u201d Lamott says. \u201cThis is how they end up with good second drafts and terrific third drafts\u201d (21).\n\n\n\nAs readers, we see the final versions of books. We pluck them from library shelves and marvel at their quality, their genius, their lyrical style, their page-turning power.\n\n\n\nWe forget that every short story, poem, memoir, and novel started as an initial draft. Every writer had to get that first draft down\u2014and that first draft was likely rambling, riddled with errors, and downright crummy.\n\n\n\nWrite Like It\u2019s Child\u2019s Play\n\n\n\nLamott gives another freeing image to take us into our project's initial writing stage:\n\n\n\n\nThe first draft is the child\u2019s draft, where you let it all pour out and then let it romp all over the place, knowing that no one is going to see it and that you can shape it later. You just let this childlike part of you channel whatever voices and visions come through and onto the page. If one of the characters wants to say, "Well, so what, Mr. Poopy Pants?,\u201d you let her. No one is going to see it. (22-23)\n\n\n\n\nWhen we write our draft like it\u2019s child\u2019s play\u2014free and even fanciful\u2014she says we may end up with one line in a paragraph buried deep on the sixth page\u2026a line that captures our imagination, and perhaps our heart.\n\n\n\nIt\u2019s a line \u201cyou just love,\u201d she writes, \u201cthat is so beautiful or wild that you know what you\u2019re supposed to be writing about, more or less, or in what direction you might go\u2014but there was no way to get to this without first getting through the first five and a half pages\u201d (23).\n\n\n\nWrite Without Judgment\n\n\n\nQuiet the voices and write without judgment, without fear, without hesitation. Like a child scribbling her story.\n\n\n\nFree.\n\n\n\nI\u2019ve never been able to confirm the original source, but Jane Smiley is attributed as saying, \u201cEvery first draft is perfect because all the first draft has to do is exist. It's perfect in its existence. The only way it could be imperfect would be to NOT exist.\u201d\n\n\n\nDon\u2019t let perfectionism hold your words hostage when you\u2019re working on that first draft. Let it all out. It\u2019s perfect for what it is: the first draft.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTo listen to the full episode, click on the podcast player above or subscribe to the "Ann Kroeker, Writing Coach" podcast on Spotify or Apple Podcast.\n\n\n\nResources: