Rough Draft

Like it or not, your emotions are a rough draft of your opinions.

What eventually becomes a deeply-seated opinion on a particular topic starts out as an impulsive, emotional reaction to that topic. And it’s very, very easy to just take that rough draft and edit it only for presentation rather than content before we turn it in.

That means we often have a gut reaction to something, and all we really do is “clean it up.” We add post-hoc reasoning that sounds high-minded but is really just the rider justifying the movement of the elephant. In other words, we rationalize.

But we don’t have to! The first step is accepting that a rough draft is just that. It isn’t something to be ashamed of, and nor is it a sunk cost we now have to justify. It’s just an initial impression. We can use it for data, edit it for content, or even throw it out entirely if that’s where the rational editorial process leads us. We should let it cool for a while before we publish.

I don’t want my strong opinions to be rough drafts with a coat of paint on them, and neither should you.