Wednesday in the Word

The Revelation Beast Might Just Be Pride, Too

Leave a comment

Revelation 13:3
3 One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast.

At the start of Revelation 13, John tells of a grotesque beast rising out of the sea–a seven-headed, ten-horned leopard with bear feet and the mouth of a lion. Biblical scholars believe this monster represents the Roman empire, or in general, the worship and glorification of secular power and authority. This creature echoes Daniel’s vision of four great beasts (Daniel 7:2-7).

In this quoted verse, the creature has taken what appears to be a fatal wound, only to completely recover, which astounds the world. What kind of beast could do this? No wonder the world follows such a beast of power. Yet this beast stands with the great dragon of Revelation 12 and Satan, all allied against God.

What Does the Beast Mean for Us?

How are we to interpret this envisioned creature for our modern times? Rich in symbolism, it is hard to analyze, but my educated guess is that the creature represents not only the glorification of the secular, but the glorification of all man’s efforts–including man’s pride-soaked efforts for the Church.

Why would I say “pride?” Well, pride, after all, is an attribute that seems able to take “fatal wounds” and recover quite easily. We get our chops busted, lick our wounds for a little while, and then go off toward something else, even something remotely Christian, searching for a way to gain more acclaim, more recognition, as if we didn’t learn last time. Any time we boast of “all we’ve done for the church” or “all we’ve given to so-and-so,” we are no longer doing these works for God’s glory, but for our own.

Man’s pride has many forms, too, just like the beast has many heads–for instance, any time we say to someone, “You need to get right with the Lord, like I have,” or “God told me to tell you your sin is an abomination,” we are making statements of self-righteousness, worshipping our own holiness instead of pointing others to God. There are many ways this beast can invade our churches, our families, and our personalities, and the attack does not always come from outside us; it may well come from within us. Speaking as one who has often courted acclaim and praise, it is a sobering thing indeed to realize that one’s own actions have been unChristian.

As humans, we are still prone to sin, even if we’ve been saved. Pride is but one of the sins we have to be careful of, since it can hide itself in even the most holy-looking actions. That’s why I think the beast of Revelation 13 is not only a vision, but a warning–we can too easily forget to worship God and start worshipping ourselves instead.

Tuesday on the Soapbox

The Pros and Cons of Straight Hair

14 Comments

There are quite a few blog articles out there about dealing with curly hair, but not a lot about straight hair, I’ve noticed. Most folks believe that curly hair is the harder type of hair to deal with, whereas straight hair seems “easier.” As an owner of straight hair, I believe I may be able to set the record straight (hee hee) about how it is to live with straight hair (and to love it, in fact!).

A Little Background, Please

I’ve had stick-straight, fine hair my entire life, and up until a few years ago, I despaired of being able to do anything with it. With my oval face shape and curvier body size, big, glossy, voluminous curls looks REALLY great on me…BUT they take many hours and lots of product to achieve. (And even then, the curls aren’t guaranteed to stay. See: prom night, when I let down my sponge-rollers after 17 hours of letting my mousse- and gel-soaked hair dry in them…and promptly saw that hard-won curl relax into straightness again. Much ARGH.) And what about the Great Brillo-Pad Spiral Perm of 1991? Let’s just not go there. :S

But a few years ago, I realized that even though I didn’t have the big amazing curls I thought I wanted, I did have something quite lovely in its own regard; straight, shiny hair.

straighthair_texture
This is how my hair dries naturally, with no product in it at all–glossy, smooth, and straight. For years I bemoaned the fact that I could do nothing “cool” with my hair…not realizing that this style was “cool” in and of itself. There are curly-haired girls who get up extra-early every morning and work for two solid hours to get their hair to look like this (much to my surprise!).

straighthair_length
I’ve generally kept my hair long and center-parted like this, and so I’ve ended up with a head of fairly easy-care hair, quite by accident. Many women cannot say that; they continue to fight their natural texture every day, as I did for several years. I suppose the big difference is that I finally got tired of fighting my hair texture and decided to run with it instead.

So, without further ado, I present to you “The Pros and Cons of Straight Hair;” straight-haired girls will probably nod and laugh, and curly-haired girls may just sit and wonder at how the “other half” lives. LOL

Pros of Straight Hair Cons of Straight Hair
  • No need for frizz serums
  • Very, VERY shiny 😀
  • Looks tidy and sleek without much effort
  • Smooths down flat to your head for sophisticated updos
  • Braids easily
  • A little easier to detangle (note, I said “a little”)
  • Easy to part
  • Things wash out of it easily (shampoo, peanut butter, marinara sauce…hey, I have long hair that likes to dip itself in food occasionally)
  • Strong, doesn’t break off easily
  • Want volume? Really? Seriously? Uh, NO.
  • Barrettes, clips, and bobby pins slide right out of your hair if they aren’t glued in or cemented in with hairspray (NOT kidding)
  • Shows greasy roots/excess hair product very easily
  • “Bedhead” texture = not cute with straight hair. More like “strung-out-on-something” texture.
  • Hair elastics must be wrapped around the hair 3 or 4 times for it to hold the hair firmly enough
  • Curling your straight hair? Don’t bother if your hair is longer than shoulder-length; the sheer weight of your hair will drag the curl right out in MINUTES.
  • Hairspray turns straight hair into an unmoving mass, like a frozen curtain
  • Any clip or barrette that has been put into your hair runs the risk of leaving a very noticeable “dent” in your hair when it’s taken out (very unflattering)

What do you think? Have I hit the nail on the head (or the hair)? 😛 Let me know in the comments!

Monday in the HTMLab

Yes, I Still Use HTML Tables for Layouts!

2 Comments

I can just about hear the astonished gasps: someone still uses HTML tables to style their pages? In this day and age of aligning everything on a webpage with CSS-styled divs?!

Some webdesigners might react not with shock, but with scorn: “Pah, only newbs and amateurs style pages with TABLES. REAL designers use only CSS for layouts.” (Don’t think webdesigners say that stuff to each other? I have been part of several design discussions where such negative terms were bandied about–very discouraging!) But after 10 years of self-taught designing, I still rely on tables for a few styles of page layouts, including the one below.

table_example
The three-column design demonstrated above (which will be part of a future layout on my main domain, withinmyworld.org) is one of the many reasons I keep tables in my layout toolbox.

Why? Because try as I might, I have never been able to get a three-column pure-CSS layout to align like this–to have the correct, even spacing between content blocks, or to just LOOK like a cohesive whole. I’ve tried a few solutions–for instance, floating a few sets of nested divs (as in, two sets of “float: left” and “float: right,” one set for two of the columns, and the second set floating the first set and the third column).

But this solution always seems too clunky, and never looks just “right” on the page, either–usually, one column ends up too far away from the others, or the content boxes are unevenly spaced apart no matter how I try to shore up the padding and margins. Plus, if the page width shrinks too much, one or two of the columns always ends up dropping down below the others–definitely not what I want, either.

So, in lieu of CSS, this is how I achieved the above look:

  • Table tag: <table border=”0″ cellpadding=”14″ cellspacing=”14″ width=”790″>
  • Each table cell: <tr><td valign=”top”></td>
  • CSS styling:
    table {font-size: 11px;}
    .tablecell {background-color: #8fd6ff;}

This is much simpler coding (a plus for someone who is self-taught, like me), plus it’s less for the browser to load. Lastly, it gives me the look I want: clean, evenly-spaced blocks of content, with a slightly darker color in between the blocks to visually separate the content even further.

If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It!

I’m a big believer in the above sentiment when it comes to webdesign. If the coding still works in all modern browsers (and hasn’t been labeled as “deprecated” by the W3C), why not use it, if it is the only tool which works precisely as we need it to work?

I admit, I’d like to find a way to make this layout work the exact same way in CSS. But unless I’m just going about it all the wrong way, I haven’t found something to match the HTML table for sheer cleanliness, ease, and even spacing on a layout with more than two columns. And I don’t think that’s a bad thing. After all, visitors to our sites are not going to know (or care) whether we used tables or divs to make our layouts–they just want a site that works and is easy to browse!

I’m not suggesting that webdesigners quit trying new coding styles entirely; I am, however, suggesting that having multiple ways to code a page can be to our benefit. And, if the only tool that works is an “older” style (such as an HTML table), it shouldn’t be a point of scorn between designers. We’re all on the same side, anyway–we’re all in the business of putting together great pages for others to view!

(PS: If you know a way to make a pure-CSS three-column layout like the one I’ve pictured above, let me know in the comments! It’d be great to augment the good ol’ HTML table with a few more dabs of CSS.)

Saturday with the Spark

Helpful Sites for the Budding Musician

Leave a comment

With almost everything in life being so digital these days, it’s no wonder music rides the cyberwaves as much as it does. But there’s a huge (and I mean HUGE) gulf of difference between buying music online and creating it for others to enjoy. The online world of music creation and promotion is a broad horizon indeed…so broad, sometimes, that it’s hard to know where to begin!

Whether you prefer toying around with music in your Web browser or seriously crafting and promoting it, there are plenty of websites out there which can help you along. Here, in the following sorted lists, are the best I’ve found:

Musical Games

Carol Maker
Music Mixer
VirtualMusicalInstruments.com (try out different instruments’ sounds)
Sound Factory
A Break in the Road (this one lets you put in your own recorded sounds!)
Isle of Tune (build a city that makes music as the cars drive around…you’ll just have to see it for yourself!)

Learn How to Make Better Music

AudioTuts
SonicAcademy
MusicTheory.net
Serious-Sounds.net (especially for people who make electronic music)
Production Advice (for learning how to master your recordings so they sound their best)
What Makes “Good” Music? (thoughtful essay on making good music)
How to Write a Song @ WikiHow

Online Tools/Sites for Musicians

Scalerator (along with the Chorderator, Chord Designer, and Guitarator Toolbox :D)
BandCamp (host your music)
SoundCloud (share your music)
TheSixtyOne (share your music AND network with other artists!)
8notes.com (online metronome, blank sheet music, MIDI converters, and more!)

Create Music

UJam
JamStudio (newbie-friendly)
Soundation.com

Also, I have a roundup of free downloadable music-creation software in this blog post.

Make an Official Website for Yourself/Your Band

HostBaby
FourFour
BandZoogle
SoundFolder

Performing and Selling Your Music

GigMasters (find places to perform and get paid!)
SonicBids (connecting bands and promoters)
CDBaby (CD-making service)

For Further Reading

Check out Mashable’s list of online music sites for even more musical websites!

Friday around the Web

Life-Changing Career Advice, Cats in Inappropriate Places, The Ballerina Project, and Breakfast Hacks

Leave a comment

3 Pieces of Career Advice that Changed My Life
Need a jumpstart in your career? Check out this short article.

Cats in Inappropriate Places
Photos guaranteed to make you snicker. 😀

The Ballerina Project
Lovely photography of ballerinas… 🙂

Top 25 Delicious Breakfast Hacks
Making a waffle with brownie mix, and tons of other hacks!

Thursday in the Zone

3 Ways to Break Out of a Gaming Rut

Leave a comment

It happens to us all, even with games we absolutely love. Sometimes, you just get TIRED of a game…it doesn’t seem to have the same level of challenge and fun that it used to. Whether the game is on a disc, online, or played on a tabletop, sometimes we just lose interest–it seems we’ve conquered everything.

But wait! Before you sell off that game disc, close out your online account, or trade away all the game pieces, take a moment to rethink. You might not be “done” with the game–you might just need a new perspective on it.

Perspective Change #1: Observe How Others Play

Once you’ve been playing a game for a long time, you can get set in certain ways of playing. You might set up your item inventory the same way all the time, or you might play certain card combos in exactly the same way. All that sameness is very comfortable, but it can also be…boring.

To start shaking up your gaming experience, simply watch other people play the game, and take note of how they do things differently from you. This works even better if you’ve lent them your game/game pieces–for instance, how do they play that Heroclix piece differently from you? What can you learn from their approach? Just taking time to appreciate another’s gaming style as opposed to your own can help you feel less bored about the game.

Perspective Change #2: Try Something New in the Same Old Game

I’m quite guilty of choosing the same character or same playstyle all the time, especially when it comes to fighting games. It’s hard for me to learn a different character’s fighting style when I’ve gotten so used to mashing X for a jump attack or A and B together for a super-punch, and so on. But choosing a different character or playstyle can be just the ticket to refreshing your interest in the game–you just have to be willing to be a “newb” again.

What do I mean by “being a newb?” I mean starting with a playstyle you’re not familiar with at all–trying something completely off-the-wall, something that goes against your traditional choice. It might be difficult at first, but think of it as a new challenge in an old game. (For instance, if you have only played Red decks in Magic: the Gathering, how about trying a Blue or White deck?) Also, ask other players for advice as you try new things; it’s not a cardinal sin, and you might just revive their interest in the game, too!

Perspective Change #3: Teach a Newbie

Not all of us are natural teachers, but you can at least demonstrate the game to a person who’s interested in playing. Show them your favorite parts of the game–if it’s a video game, show them your favorite area of the game, or your weapons/items of choice, for instance. Tell them why you enjoyed these bits of the game so much, and what drew you to these items, etc.

As you show the new player these game features, take time to observe their reactions, and really listen to their questions. For them, this is all uncharted territory–it’s all new and exciting! Allow this attitude of discovery to rub off on you; see your old “boring” game through their eyes. Who knows, they might discover something new about the game or point out a challenge you never knew was there. Remember the old adage about “seeing things with fresh eyes?”

Summary

Gaming ruts don’t have to last forever! With these tips, you might just find a whole new gaming experience hiding underneath all that boredom. Give them a shot!

Wednesday in the Word

A Quick yet Faith-Based Prayer

Leave a comment

Psalm 71:12
12 Do not be far from me, my God;
come quickly, God, to help me.

This simple verse, couched within a psalm about trusting in God when old age comes and strength wanes, is a prayer that all Christians, new and established, young and old, can remember and repeat in times of trouble.

Ascribed to David because of the references to “enemies conspiring together” against the psalmist in verse 10, Psalm 71 is most especially about hope in God when the world has failed us. Though verse 12 seems desperate, as if the psalmist feels God is far away, the rest of the psalm expresses trust that no matter what happens, God will be there–God has been the “rock,” the “fortress,” the “hope” of the psalmist’s life before, and He will be again.

We, too, can call out to God with this same assurance, and God will be there. His rescue and help may not manifest in ways we expect, but it will always be perfectly timed, and the help we receive will always be enough to cover our needs. These were truths David knew firsthand from his earlier experiences, and they are truths we can still depend on today. Just ask anyone who has experienced God working in their lives!

Tuesday on the Soapbox

“Silent” Migraines: They DO Exist

1 Comment

Confused by the title of this article? I was just as confused when I first began to realize I suffered silent migraines. I didn’t even know quite what they were until I began doing some migraine research on my own, and discovered this strange sub-type of migraine headaches, which has only recently been researched.

How Regular Migraines and “Silent” Migraines Compare

Migraines vary a lot from person to person, and each migraine sufferer can even experience various types of migraines. Most migraines follow a basic pattern like the following:

  • Prodrome phase, or the “Watch out, a migraine is coming!” phase. During prodrome, you can become more irritable, confused, or experience weird physical symptoms of sickness out of nowhere. 1 out of 4 people with migraines have this, sometimes even a full day before the migraine officially hits.
  • Aura phase, characterized by just plain weirdness going on in your senses. You may see flashes of color or lightning-bolt patterns zigzagging across your vision; you might hear random high pitches or strange noises that aren’t in the actual environment. You might even have some problems with speaking or writing, though not as pronounced as stroke victims. 1 in 5 people with migraines have this, and it usually lasts about an hour.
  • Pain phase, also known as the “please kill me now” phase. Throbbing pain, usually on one side of your head, sometimes death-gripping a vein in your forehead and sometimes stabbing into your eye, is common. Plus, the intense head pain can trigger your stomach into nausea, and everything in your environment is either BRIGHT, LOUD, or both at once. Basically, it sidelines you from your life for however long it decides to last. (Oh, and if you didn’t take medicine during the Prodrome or Aura phase, you have to ride the Pain phase out on your own–any medicine just flat won’t work once the pain is in full swing. This is what a lot of non-migraine sufferers just don’t get. X_x)
  • Resolution phase, or “thank God it’s over.” After an event like this, you’ll be very tired and cranky for a good while, sometimes even a full day after the migraine finally decides to vacate the premises of your head.

But silent migraines are a strange sub-breed–strange in that the sufferer can experience prodrome, aura, and resolution, but never experiences pain.

Symptoms of a Silent Migraine

At first, I was overjoyed to learn that some of my migraines could in fact be silent. “You mean I can have a normal life occasionally?!” I thought. “Heck, if I didn’t have to go through all that pain, I’d be happy to live with a ‘silent migraine!'”

Well, I thought that at least until I started looking at the symptom list:

Physical Symptoms

diarrhea
nausea
vomiting
food cravings
loss of appetite
thirst
increased urination
chills
fatigue
vertigo

Emotional/Mental Symptoms

confusion
irritability
euphoria
amnesia

Aura Symptoms

wavy or jagged lines, dots, or spots in your vision
flashing lights
blind spots
cloudy/blurry vision
tunnel vision
disruptions in hearing/hearing loss
auditory hallucinations
distortions in smell or taste
numbness
pins-and-needles sensations
other unusual body sensations
difficulty remembering or saying a word
other language difficulties

Sources for this table: WebMD.com; Migraine.com

When I read this list, I was shocked: so many of the conditions I have had to become accustomed to experiencing, either with head pain or without, are all over this list. The most random food cravings or complete loss of appetite, with no stomach disturbance apparent; difficulty remembering words, so rampant that I thought something was wrong with me mentally; pins-and-needles feelings all over my body, for no reason. Most if not all of these symptoms precede my head pain, but even when they don’t, I end up absolutely exhausted afterwards, just like I’ve had a migraine.

It’s almost easier to have the head pain than not have it, in some ways, because these symptoms by themselves don’t make much sense. Saying “I have a migraine” is at least understandable to most folks, even if they have the blissful ignorance of never experiencing migraines for themselves. But saying “Hey, I have a migraine–well, sorta, kinda–well, actually, I’m not having a headache per se, but I have all the other symptoms…yeah…?” Not only is it a headache to try to explain, but it sounds suspiciously like a cop-out excuse. Let me assure you, it is NOT.

Why Are Silent Migraines “Silent?”

People have thought for years that migraines were just the result of blood flow being squeezed off to one part of the brain–that the sudden contraction of a vein, followed by the normal amount of blood trying to stuff itself through the resulting bottleneck, creates the pain. Blood gridlock, in other words.

However, now some new research involving fMRI (functional MRI) machines has uncovered a neurological component to migraines. Basically, the nerve cells in various bits of the brain get WAY overstimulated right before a migraine event, and then sink WAY down in activity. The neighboring blood vessels swell up, or dilate, to deliver more blood to the overstimulated nerve cells–and a migraine is born.

This heightened nerve activity is what causes all the weird visual, auditory, and sensory hallucinations present in a classic migraine’s Aura phase. But sometimes, apparently, the heightened nerve activity happens, but doesn’t trigger the blood vessels to dilate…which results in a silent migraine. The brain is still just as bothered and irritable as it would be during a regular migraine, but there’s no physical blood-vessel pain to go with it.

A Silent Migraine By Any Other Name is Just as Weird

Silent migraines can pop up in anyone’s brain, no matter if you’ve had regular painful migraines or not. Silent migraines are also called:

  • Acephalgic migraine
  • Isolated visual migraine
  • Amigranous migraine
  • Late-onset migraine accompaniment (for people over 40 who suddenly get their first migraine aura symptoms)
  • Migraine dissocie (French for a “migraine disassociated” from pain)
  • Migraine equivalent/migraine variant
  • Typical aura without headache

Sources for this list: Migraine.com; Headaches.About.com

(Note: Ocular migraine is often a painless migraine with weird visual symptoms, but nothing auditory or sensory. Silent migraines run the gamut of physical symptoms of migraine, just without the pain.)

Whatever you want to call it. it’s just plain weird. And it could be occurring in your own head a lot more often than you realize, especially if any or all of those symptoms in the above list seem familiar.

How to Treat a Silent Migraine

As I did research for this very article, I began to wonder if I wasn’t walking around with a constant silent migraine, which occasionally morphed into its bigger badder sibling when I wasn’t looking. I had about grown used to walking around feeling like gum scraped off somebody’s shoe–but what if there was a way to stop it?

First of all, I suggest that if you’re experiencing anything like these symptoms, with head pain or without, you need to get checked out by a doctor. Occasionally, these symptoms can warn of more serious things like trans-ischemic attacks (aka “mini-strokes”) or epileptic seizures.

However, if you’ve gotten checked and the doctor tells you it’s migraines, silent or otherwise, then here are some of the best treatments:

  • Take your prescribed medication as quick as you can. Remember what I said about medicine not working if you take it too late in the Pain phase? Yeah.
  • Be careful what medication you take. My migraines are made worse by caffeine, for instance, so I have to avoid medicine that includes caffeine in its pill, like Excedrin Migraine or Bayer Migraine. Finding a med that works for your personal migraines is about 50/50 trial/error and luck.
  • Get to a quiet, restful place with dim or no lighting, and lie down if possible.
  • If you can stand the noise and light, turn on some light entertainment to take your mind off the pain. Most people suggest absolutely dark and silent rooms, but I find that I go absolutely bonkers with boredom, lying there with only my pain to focus on till either the medication works or I drift off to fitful sleep. Thus, I usually choose a favorite comedy DVD, turn the volume a little lower than normal, and shut my eyes to listen to it. The laughter helps, as long as you don’t laugh so hard that you make your head hurt worse!
  • Most people say their migraines are helped by sleep; if you feel like you could drift right off, go ahead. Just make sure that your neck is not in a weird position, otherwise, you could end up with a nasty tension headache moving in where your migraine left off. (Speaking from experience here…ugh.)
  • When your migraine is over, do your best to get some good rest, eat well (especially if nausea left you without an appetite before), and de-stress. Lack of sleep and food plus excess stress pretty much equals a migraine. This can be very difficult to achieve in this day and time, but if you don’t want to be sidelined for days with a migraine, it might be worth it to try these tips.

I find, generally, that my silent migraine symptoms are a little less in intensity than my painful migraine symptoms. Nevertheless, these symptoms are nothing to play around with. If you can get those little nerve cells to quit misbehaving a little sooner, you’ll feel much better; the above treatments, which are usually for “classic” migraines, actually do work for silent ones too!

For Further Information

Silent Migraine @ Migraine.com
What Are Silent Migraines? @ WebMD.com
What is a Silent Migraine? @ Headaches.about.com
Acephalgic Migraine @ Wikipedia

Monday in the HTMLab

How Do You Pronounce “HTML?” (And Other Funny Pronunciations)

Leave a comment

As webdesigners and developers, much of our work is nonverbal–we simply type it, upload it, and that’s that. But I find that when I’m drafting code, especially very difficult or time-consuming code, I end up saying what I’m typing as I go along (usually under my breath in a really irritated tone, LOL).

As I was debugging a particularly annoying piece of code for my upcoming video games fansite the other day, it occurred to me that I was doing this. Not only that, but I’d come up with some pretty strange pronunciations along the way…pronunciations which my brain considered “correct,” but which sounded pretty silly coming out of my mouth!

Check out the list below, and compare them to your own pronunciations–do any of yours appear here?

My (Strange) Mental Webdesign Pronunciations

  • HTML: Hut-mul
  • px: Picks
  • src: Surc (like “surf” with a “c” at the end)
  • CSS: Suss
  • $variable: CHA-CHING! variable (I kid you not, I caught myself doing this xD)
  • em: um
  • href: Huh-reff (all one syllable)
  • &nbsp: Nus-bup (yes, I know it doesn’t match the spelling, but it works)
  • valign: Vee-align
  • GIF: Jif (because gif with a “guh” sound at the beginning sounds wrong for some reason)
  • ?>: Huh? bracket
  • //: Suh-slash

And the piece de resistance…

  • if (!isset($var)): if MEEP! izzet CHA-CHING! var
    (with “var” pronounced like the first syllable of “varmint”–hey, I’m from the South, all right? xD)

Anybody Else Do This?

Have you ever noticed yourself doing this, or have you come up with your own pronunciations of various webdesign code? Let me know in the comments!

Saturday with the Spark

“So What?” The Silly Question That Can Polish Our Writing

Leave a comment

As writers, when we get all wrapped up in a plot idea or go crazy with character development, sometimes the words flow out as if we’re erupting, with lava-hot paragraphs cascading down the page at a blazing speed. Who cares if this sentence isn’t written the best or has a few misspelled words, for instance–the plot must go on!!

But once our writing ardor has cooled, once the mental volcano of literary inspiration has settled back down, we must go back and critically examine our work, beginning to shape the raw flows of words into art. This can be INCREDIBLY daunting–I should know, I’ve been doing this intermittently on my novel for several months. I know well that it gets difficult to cut away some of your most fervent words, some of the awesome sentences that arose out of the huge head of steam you had when you first wrote this paragraph or that page.

So how do you do it? Simple: with every paragraph, every sentence, ask yourself:

SO WHAT?

Yes, It Actually Works–You Just Have to Be Honest

You might be surprised that such a simple, silly-sounding question could help you know what to cut and what to keep in your writing. But it really does. Ask yourself “so what?” after every paragraph, sentence, or even word; ask yourself whether that part of your writing REALLY needs to be there in order to impart your meaning.

When you ask yourself “So what?” about your own writing, it’s tempting to be light-handed with criticism. Don’t. Be ruthless if you have to; dare to see your writing as a reader will. You are the artist of this written work–you have a responsibility to produce the best quality writing you can.

An Example

Here’s an example paragraph I wrote to demo this process:

“The fabric of her dress shimmered faintly in the moonlight. It looked silken, inexplicably heavy on her slight frame–she looked almost overwhelmed with the folds of blue-green fabric. On this muggy, uncomfortable night of about 80 degrees, who would wear such a dress except for those who were rich enough to have a cool shelter to retreat within?”

Start the “So What?” Process

The above paragraph is pretty good. Now, I have to dig into it, tear it apart a little bit, and see how I can make it even better.

“The fabric of her dress shimmered faintly in the moonlight.” So what?

  • Adds atmosphere
  • Gives hints of the setting
  • Phrased somewhat poetically, could be tightened up a bit

“It looked silken, inexplicably heavy on her slight frame.” So what?

  • Does the detail of the dress fabric have to be explicitly stated?
  • The last part of the sentence gives more hints about the character–good

“She looked almost overwhelmed with the folds of blue-green fabric.” So what?

  • More character information, but this could be folded into the previous bit of description
  • There has to be a better word for describing the color, and a synonym for “fabric”–or maybe take that out altogether?

“On this muggy, uncomfortable night of about 80 degrees, who would wear such a dress…” So what?

  • Don’t need the “of about 80 degrees” part–too specific/scientific
  • “Muggy” automatically conjures up “uncomfortable”–can trim that if need be
  • “who would wear such a dress”–implies a narrator’s judgment

“…except for those who were rich enough to have a cool shelter to retreat within?” So what?

  • More narrator judgment–negative in tone, so it provides a little drama
  • Moves the story along to the next paragraph
  • Can we get rid of the preposition at the end of the sentence? Please? LOL

The Result: A Better Paragraph (IMO)

Okay, now I have an idea of how I want to rewrite it…so I take my own advice, and reshape the paragraph entirely. Here’s my second draft as the “result” of this process:

“Her dress, with all its silken, heavy turquoise folds, shimmered faintly in the moonlight as it draped on her, just as the muggy air hung over all of us. On such an uncomfortable night, who would wear such a gown, except for those who were rich enough to have a cool shelter in which to retreat?”

I think this paragraph says more in less space, which is always good from a reader’s standpoint; the scene is, if possible, even more described now. I also think the phrases and sentences are a little bit more graceful and “finished”-sounding than the first draft. (But, as always, writing is subjective–which paragraph did you like best?)

Summary

When you take time to revisit and rewrite your own writing, you have to be honest about each word, each paragraph, each page. Asking yourself “So what?” after each section of your writing will alert you to ill-chosen words, weird extraneous information, and anything else that could distract your reader from your amazing plot and characters. It just takes being willing to step back from your work a bit and really seeing your writing for what it is, aside from being your hard work.