4 Tips to Good Self Editing
Editing is a necessary self-evil. When you take the time to edit your work, it will look professional, without mistakes and reflect the quality of your services.
Here are some tips to help you become a great self editor.
1. Know what you are trying to say.
If your writing tends to ramble, you will quickly lose your reader's interest. Make sure you know what the goal of your work is and write that down before you even start. Then when you are editing, take a look at your writing goal and see if your work follows what you set out to accomplish.
2. Take some time away from your writing.
It is highly recommended that you take some time away from working on your writing after it is done. This can be from a few hours to several weeks. This will make sure that fresh eyes will review the writing and things you did not see yesterday you will pop out today.
3. Read it out loud.
When we read to ourselves, our minds tend to gloss over mistakes. However, if we read what we have written slowly and out loud, reading every word, then it is amazing how we can catch errors that we may have never seen before.
4. Print it out so you are not reading it off a computer screen.
Print out your work rather than trying to edit it on a computer screen. Using a hard copy allows you to mark it up and see what you have written. When you change the medium, your eyes get to see your writing from a different viewpoint. You are more likely to pick up errors, or see how you can make your work even tighter when you have it in hand.
These are just 4 tips to help you get going in self-editing your work. Editing is not easy. It takes practice but the result will be well worth it when you see your published work.
self editing, self publishing 
Reader Comments (2)
I have been a web editor for years now. As the copy director for a website design and hosting company, editor-in-chief for dental blogs. com, and owner/editor of http://www.ilivecommunity.com, I constantly edit my work and submissions. These tips are awesome, and I would have loved them when I was a newbie on the scene. Tip number one is superb. The biggest challenge I see with non-writers and new writers is an inability to organize content on the page. Practice makes perfect, tho! That is, if you believe in perfection...which I do not ;-).
Thanks for your post Shauna. I agree that the more you write, the better you become. I doubt that we can ever reach perfection, but we can strive for it in our writing!
I am interested in whether or not you ever send your stuff out to be "professionally" edited (beyond your professionalism that is?) Is that something that you ever consider? If so, when would you consider that?
If you would be interested in doing a guest post on working with new writers, I am sure our readers would love to hear from you. Just let me know.
Thanks- Candace