1. You’re already your worst critic. Who better to scrutinize your words than the person who wrote them?

2. It’s not that we CAN’T see the flaws in our own work. We just don’t LIKE IT.

3. As you learn to separate writing and revising, you gain the discipline necessary to excel at both.

4. At some point, you have to learn to laugh at yourself, and how many times you use the same word/phrase over and over and over and over …

5. It forces you to not only recognize your own mistakes, but also to learn how to fix them.

6. It’s important to learn how to rely on yourself, first and foremost, for encouragement and support.

7. Self-editing teaches you to recognize the parts of your own writing you love while identifying the parts you don’t — and which of those you want to work on improving.

8. Confidence comes from saying: “I liked that sentence. That was a GOOD sentence. I wrote that sentence.”

9. The best way to learn from your mistakes is to stare at them for hours on end, day after day, month after month!

10. Even if you think you’ve done your best work, your best work can almost always improve.

11. No one likes to edit their own work. Actually doing it — something you don’t want to do — is a sign of strength.

12. It’s up to you to take a messy first draft and clean it up. Only then can someone else come along and help you turn it into something amazing.

Meg is the creator of Novelty Revisions, dedicated to helping writers put their ideas into words. She is an editor and writer, and a 12-time NaNoWriMo winner. Follow Meg on Twitter for tweets about writing, food, and Star Wars.

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