: Re: What methods can I use to revise my writing? Background I am finding it challenging to transform an early draft into a finished product. My biggest challenges are putting the prose in the

@Debbie451

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@Kate The first time around, I have a nice outline with a logical flow, the second time around, the flow has been lost, and I am interested in knowing the steps and order of steps required to put Humpty back together again. – David 14 hours ago

For the future: Your problem is that you start editing and fixing your second round with the prose version instead of the outline. That's why you keep getting into trouble. You have an orderly first draft which works from an outline, with nice transitions, and then you start adding things pell-mell without regard for how they fit. Stop doing that.

If you are reading through your first draft and you think of things to add, add them to the outline instead. Keep adding everything to the outline. When you have no more to add, then you start rewriting your second draft.

For now: Yes, you are going to have to reverse-engineer some of your work. Here's how:

Take every sentence or thought — two or three sentences at the absolute most — and make it a bullet point. Do this for the entire piece.

When all your sentences are bullet points, start putting them back into the outline. Add your III/a, IV/2/b/47 extra sections as necessary. Your outline is going to look like this, with the bold section representing something new added in:

I. Gardening
A. Planting
1. Choose your plants
• Decide whether you want to plant flowers, ornamentals, vegetables, or fruit-bearing plants.
1a. Start your own from seeds, or buy seedlings?
a. Benefits of starting from seeds
1) Cheaper
2) Educational
b. Benefits of buying seedlings
1) Who has the time to raise plants from seeds? I work for a living.
2) Seedlings are generally sold when it's time to plant them, so you don't risk getting them into the ground before they're ready.
3) Supports local business
• Buy your seedlings.
2. Read the planting instructions.
3. Choose a location.
a. Considerations
• Sun vs. shade
• Acidity of soil
• Watering: Are you depending on rain, or will you water regularly?
b. Sunlight
• Sunny
• Shady

Do this as many rounds as you need to. Once you're satisfied that you have no more to add, THAT'S when you start smoothing out to prose and adding transitions and topic sentences.

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