Saturday, July 26, 2008

Waste is a terrible thing

Quick advice: Just drop "in order to" from your writing. It's wasteful. When you next get the urge, delete those three little words and see how you've empowered your sentence. Same goes for "in fact." Ditch those words; not needed. Don't let anything get in the way of you getting to the point of what you want to say. Less is more -- three words you'll hear often from me.

That said, I'm wondering about other kinds of waste. The waste of energy doing the wrong thing, when the right thing is far easier to do. The waste of time spent on people not worth your while -- I don't advocate rudeness, I just don't think you owe everyone a piece of you. (I've learned this the hard way -- I'd write "very hard way," but that would be a waste of the word "very" when "hard" says it all.) Save your precious self for those who count.

I'm hoping to offer food for thought on all kinds of waste; life is about managing it. I don't come close to having all the answers, but sometimes it's the right question that brings you to enlightment.

Yours in waste management, WMW

Don't waste your talent

Whatever you do, don't undermine your efforts with clumsy writing, poor grammar and unclear thoughts. It doesn't matter how smart you are, how glib, how talented. If you can't get your smarts across with the written word, you're forgettable at best, and unforgettable at worst.

Find the power of your words by not wasting them.

Think about this. With so much writing on the Internet, shouldn't yours be among the best? With so much competition in the business world, shouldn't your message be the one that matters? If grades count to you, shouldn't your writing?

Shouldn't you stand out from the crowd?

Let me help you with the waste management of language. Let me show you just how outstanding you can be.

Yours in waste management, WMW