Exercise: write the deep version

This is the most important lesson in the course. What you start in the next fifteen minutes is the foundation everything else gets built on. Give this first pass fifteen minutes, get all four stages onto the page without editing, and let the mature deep version grow over later sittings. Take it seriously.

The three rules

The worksheet for this lesson is built into the page below. It has the four-stage prompts and Clara’s story as a reference, and it saves what you write as you go. Work in it, or alongside wherever you prefer to write. Here are the rules.

Rule one: write without editing. The single most destructive thing you can do in this exercise is edit while you write. Editing produces careful, guarded prose that sounds competent and feels like nothing. You will have time to edit later. Right now, write. If the page freezes you, talk instead. Record it as a voice note, as if telling someone who asked, and paste the transcript in.

Rule two: this version is private. It has no audience except you. Include the things you would not normally say in a professional context. The genuine doubt. The personal relationship that shaped the conviction. The moment you almost stopped. The specific reason this work is yours to do and not someone else’s. The more honest and specific this version is, the more powerful every adapted version becomes.