#STRask - How Can I Improve My Informal Writing?

Episode Date: October 6, 2025

Question about how you can improve your informal writing (e.g., blog posts) when you don’t have access to an editor.   Do you have any thoughts or advice on how best to improve my informal writing (e.g., blog posts) when I don’t have access to an editor?

You're listening to Amy Hall and Greg Kokel on Stand to Reasons, hashtag STRSk podcast. Here we are. Here we are. And in the last episode, Greg, we were talking about advice for doing apologetics. Right. So we're going to continue along on that and with a question from Dan. Do you have any thoughts or advice on how best to improve informal writing, for example, a blog post, podcast content, when one does not have access to an Amy Hall or someone similar? Or perhaps we could allow human cloning in this one case.

Notice who gets the credit here. You know what's funny, Greg? And credit due. I didn't. I wrestled with whether I wanted to take that part out because I didn't want this to sound self-serving. But I wanted to give Dan his due because it was funny. Right. So I didn't want to cut him off. No, that's, that's, it's actually accurate, too. I mean, it is, and by the way, this is a very important point. When people tell me, for example, I'm writing a book, all right. And I know this is more for informal stuff, but we'll just throw a bunch of stuff in here together. I'm writing a book. I said, okay, what is it? I'm on apologetics. Okay. And I ask, well, who's your publisher? Oh, I don't have a publisher yet. I'm going to write it and see if I could sell it kind of idea. Now, there's two problems with that.

right away. First one is he's writing a book on apologetics. There are a thousand titles on apologetics right now. It is very difficult to write anything that anyone's ever said that hasn't said yet and have a market for it. And a lot of the folks who are just writing their own books, they don't have any footprint, so they're not going to be able to sell much. And it's going to be hard to attract a publisher. But secondly is they got it back You don't write the book and sell the book. You sell the book and then you write the book. That is, if you're going with a publishing house. And that's done through a book proposal. There's a whole sequence there because you don't want to go through all the trouble of writing, you know, 40, 50, 60,000 words and then not be able to have it published. So there's a standard, especially with nonfiction. That's the pattern. Okay. Now, some people are writing books like that. And it's principally, it turns out, to organize their own thinking and their own thoughts. And writing is a great way to do that because the most important element of any communication, including writing, is clarity, not cleverness, clarity.

And clarity is accomplished through structure. Structure, structure, structure. That's what J.P. Morland used to say. And I agree with him. All right. Now, this is true, not just in more commercial attempts, but also in informal stuff. when you're writing a blog, et cetera. You want your material to be structured well.

You want it to flow in a very particular way to make the points clearly. So remember, clarity is the most important, even in a short piece, and clarity is determined by structure. Now, I'm presuming these are not just texts, you're sending somebody about this and that, but pieces that are, you put in a blog post or something like that for its or a to a tweet for its compelling character. Now, in tweets, they're very short, so there's not much to structure except for sentence structure.

You still want to get your point across clearly, and sometimes cleverness helps you to do that if you say it well, okay? So the first thing is clarity based on structure. Secondly, in no particular order, just as they come to mind, I'm just saying the second point I want to make is that proofread everything. you're right. I proofread even my texts, and there is a practical reason for that, and that is since I dictate my texts much of the time, that's much easier than typing using my phone, I want to make sure that it didn't say something I didn't mean to say, especially if it's naughty,

and that sometimes comes up, right? So I want to make sure, but I'm also looking, what am I looking for, punctuation, sentence structure, all that. I do not think, that texting is an opportunity to speak in Pigeon English. You can do that if you want. You get your ideas across. But for me, I'm a writer, and I don't want any writing that I do to go out and look sloppy. And it becomes a discipline for me to be a more effective communicator in writing.

Okay, so I'm going to proofread it and make sure my punctuation is right, my words are right, the capitalization is right, And the flow is clear, okay, even in a text. So that's the second thing. Now, when it comes to this kind of writing, even though it's characterized as informal, that would be blogs or twitters, as opposed to, or do they call them X's now, I don't know. Oh, gosh, I'm not sure. But you guys know what I'm talking about.

I encourage you still to approach these things as a writer. So you think in your head, I'm a writer. In fact, books that teach you about writing will say this. Identify yourself as a writer because it's going to change your attitude about what you do. And when you start doing it then, you're thinking, I'm doing this not as some person jotting ideas down, But I'm a writer, and it's a craft, and so I want to rise to the highest level of my craft that I can. It doesn't mean that you're spending hours and hours and hours on a text that you're trying to make sure it's just right. But you want to give attention to that, those details.

If you're going to write a blog, apparently you're going to write a blog about something, something substantive, or where those ideas come from. My principle here is I never lose an idea. So on the way in this morning, Amy, we talked on the phone a little bit as we were both making our commute in, but also as part of my commute, I was thinking about something that I'd been praying about that had to do with an engagement that's coming up that's ideologically contrary, all right. I have skeptics on the other side. and I'm thinking, okay, these ideas are coming to mind. And so what am I doing? I push the button and I'm sending myself an email and I'm driving and I'm dictating. I'm not trying to form it into a particular structure at that point.

I'm trying to get my ideas, my cogent ideas down. And sometimes when I'm just talking about it or reflecting on it, a phrase will come up that I think that is just the right way I want to say it. and I want to make sure I don't lose that because intellectual lightning rarely hits twice in the same spot. So the principle here is don't lose anything valuable. Find some way to write it down, record it, save it. The advantage of an email to yourself is you can cut and paste that to a word file or something like that and then work on it before you put it into your text or your blog. I never, when I'm doing something like this, even letters that I have that are dealing with a difficult, say, emails where I'm going back and forth with someone professionally or on a challenging issue, I want to form it well so it's persuasive.

And so I am going to set that aside in a word file and work on it for a while before I then, okay, I'm happy with that I cut and paste it into the email I send it out. I guess, I mean, there's more I could say, and maybe as you have on some things, I'll think some more. But the point of thinking of yourself as developing a craft of good writing is going to itself, as opposed to just blurting it out and getting it down, or that's adequate, they get the idea. Okay, fine. Well, if you're going to do it that way and you're going to, if you're going to write sloppy, you're going to write sloppy. You're not going to get better. And if you write sloppy, you're going to think sloppy, in my view.

And if you think sloppy, you're going to talk sloppy. So this is all part of a larger element of being careful how you communicate in words on paper, as it were, so that your thinking is more clear and your communication is going to be more clear as well. I think I've developed an ability to organize things quickly in my mind, kind of on the run, partly because I have worked at the habit of doing that over time and taken the time before I put something out to craft it so that it has the greatest effect. Whether it's a blog, whether it's a tweet, whether it's a mentoring letter that many of you get, or that's only 800 words, or a solid ground, an alternate months, that's 3,500 words. I still want this to be good stuff, all right?

The last point I'll make is the most important line in your piece is the first line. The most important line in your piece is the first line, because your first line, how it reads and how it affects the reader will determine whether they read the same. second line or finish the first paragraph, and that's the second most important thing, your first paragraph, because that will determine whether you read the next paragraph. It is very easy for people to push that delete button and gone. You want to bring them in with that first line or their first paragraph. That's the hook. And I'd invite people to read anything that I've written, whether it's a mentoring letter

or a solid ground, you're going to find, I hope, that that first line, or two or three, certainly the first paragraph, is captivating, and when you stop at that first couple lines, you think, I want to keep reading, because that's absolutely key. One other thought I'd say, too, sorry. Okay, go ahead. And this is a standard dictum, the way I'm putting it, comes from a great instructor in writing, and his name is Zanzer, Z-I-N-S-S-E-R, I don't know his first name, Howard, James, whatever, Zinzer, and the book is a classic. It's called On Writing Well. On Writing Well. Okay. And here's what he says. Give to the reader the most information and take from the reader the least time. Give to the reader the most information, but take from the reader the least time. And so that means you want to practice word parsimable.

boony. You don't want any other words in there that do not belong, that don't help you, and don't drive you directly to the end of what you're talking about. Don't add roadblocks for the reader. Yes, that's right. Or speed bumps. This is what Amy's really good at, because when I give her a piece, she sees the speed bumps, and she's got to pause. And if you've got to pause, this could mean this or this could be that, you've broken the, what's the right word? The flow of the past... The flow of thought, but I'm thinking of the mental attitude to the reader.

You want a reader absorbed your material not realizing their reading, just enjoying and following through, and you wake them up when you hit a road bump, a roadblock or a speed bump, where there's an ambiguity. And so Amy has saved me from lots of those kinds of flaws. And it can be anyone reading your piece. In fact, if it's somebody who isn't familiar with the material, that's a great person to have read it, because a lot of times you'll be writing and you are thinking all these things in the background, you forget that people don't know. You have more information than they do. And you forget when you're writing that there are people out there who don't see what you're thinking but not writing. And so if they're not familiar with the topic, it's a good idea to have them read it because they will be able to say, I have no idea what this means that you just said, what is that about or how did you get here? You know, so have someone else. read it, if you can, to help you through this. That has a term, by the way, what you just described. There's a name for that.

You know it. It's called the Curse of Knowledge. Oh, yes. The curse of knowledge. In other words, you know it. And so you think by just giving a snappy explanation or covering it very quickly, other people are going to know it as well as you do. And that's not the case.

They get lost very easily with new material. So another way that you can get feedback from people who are going to challenge you, if at all possible, leave your comments open if you're writing on a blog or you're writing things on Facebook or whatever it is. Now, unfortunately, we had to shut down our comments because for a lot of reasons, but I felt like it was starting to train people to respond in. bad ways because of the people who were on there and unfortunately didn't work out. But while we had those comments, I learned so much about how to see what I was writing through the eyes of people who disagree or the eyes of people who don't understand. And having those comments will help you to start anticipating objections and then you can head those off in your writing before they even get there. Right, right. So learning how to anticipate objections is a huge help.

here. Now, here are a few more things. I have a lot of ideas because I've written for the blog for so many years, and I've had to learn the hard way about a lot of these things. Don't leave rabbit trails for people to follow away from your main point. You have to be brutally focused on the point if you're writing a short thing like a blog post. Because if you even leave, throw one little thing out there about a different topic, I guarantee you everyone's going to go after that little topic and they're going to start arguing about it and you're going to be left saying, you've missed my point. And the hard thing is, a lot of times you really want to put that comment in because it's just, it's so clever and it's so fun. But do not give into that.

You have to stay focused when you're writing a short piece. You are going to be tempted to look clever and to say clever things, but you cannot make that your highest goal. Right. And there's an aphorism for that one, too. Murder your little darlings. Murder your little darling. Actually, you can probably Google that and find the person who made up that phrase. But murder your little darlings.

There are these things that just, ooh, I just really like that. But it doesn't really serve you well. And a lot of the little darlings draw attention to the writer in an inappropriate way. You know, I hate it when people make like a little pun, and they go, pun intended. So what if I, what's that person done? That writer pulls you out of the material, he said, look at me, aren't I clever? Well, you don't want to draw attention to yourself that way. Just write and let the, let the material speak for itself.

And don't draw attention to yourself as a writer. And sometimes those little darlings are exactly that, you know, and you've got to pull those out because they're not on the main line of the point you're making, which is the point you're making right now. And along these same lines, and this is something I've learned over time, when you are writing a title for your piece, this is where you can go wrong right off the bat. If you are not very focused on your topic when you write your title, people will you'll know that they're not actually reading your piece because they'll respond to the title.

To reacting to the title. So the title, if it doesn't really capture the main point of your piece or it's so clever that it's not clear what your main point is, then you have to work on that. Now, this is something, again, I've changed kind of how I do the titles over time. I tended to have shorter titles when I first started, but over time I've learned to make them a little bit,

longer so that they capture the idea of the piece because you want people coming in, you want them to get what they think they're going to get. Because if you have a title that seems like it's going to answer a different question and then you don't answer it, people are going to be mad. Date and switch. That's the problem with clickbait. Yes, you don't want to do that. Trust me. You want to capture your main idea in a way that's clear and people will get what they come to get. So, again, avoid really clever titles that don't tell people what you're going to be talking about because then they won't even bother. They won't bother to read it. Now, maybe your people who read it all the time will bother because they know that you're going to say something interesting,

but you're not going to get any new readers if you have some clever wordplay that doesn't say what you're going to be talking about. Well, the title is almost like that first line. That is what draws them in to read the first line. And just an inside story, and there's some of you might know this, but the story of reality wasn't the first title for that book. It was the subtitle. The first title was one I'd been using for years and years as I was developing this material and teaching it.

The first title was Credo. Now, cradle means I believe. And so those who are familiar with the story of reality will think, well, yeah, that's the creed. These are the God, man, Jesus, cross resurrection. Okay, I get that. That's the basics. But I'm having dinner with J. Warner Wallace, and, you know, Jim will just throw you their mat, like, instantly.

And he says, he said, I had gotten a couple of chapters into the book, which he'd read, and he said, that cradle, that's a stupid title. Nobody's going to pick up that book, man. Maybe some theology student, but that's not going to work. And it was a very good point, and within 45 seconds he had convinced me. So I moved the, um, sometimes. title in the first position, the title is the story of reality, and I think many people will see that that's a much more engaging title. And then I pulled a sentence from the first

paragraph of the book as the subtitle, how the world began, how it ends, and everything important that happens in between. Now, there you have a longer title. And in fact, the publisher first objected to the length. And I said, Ryan, just after back and forth, I said, just read it out loud. And so he got back with me. He said, okay, we'll go with it. Because I think it does have a euphony, a nice sound to it, and it does have that element where it draws the reader into the material. And on that note, this is something you do often is you read the whole piece out loud, and that'll help you catch if you're missing a word, because sometimes when you're writing it yourself, your brain fills in these missing words or things.

So reading it out loud is another thing that helps. Read other things. work on your writing by reading other writers, get a lot of practice. That's a big deal when you're learning how to write. Yeah, Stephen King and his book on writing, I think, which I read. And it's a little bit coarse of just letting people know. But nevertheless, he's got some great stuff in there, obviously. And he just said, if you want to be a writer, you've got to write, write, write, write, right, right, right, right, and never stop kind of thing. that's what builds your skill. I made a reference earlier to something

I didn't use the word, or maybe I did, euphony. Euphony is a good sound, and you want your text to be euphonic. So this is reading out loud, like you mentioned, Amy, will help you to see if it sounds nice to the ear. And alliteration,

where you have repetition of consonant sounds, this adds to the euphony. So a big bang needs a big banger. Okay, notice the bees there. That has a nice sound to it, right? It's also memorable the way it's put together. So it's an an aphorism. But alliterations are something that help words, the text to sound good when you're reading and it flows better. Euphony. And don't be afraid as you're writing in informal writings like a blog post to put yourself and your personality into your writing. Don't, don't disconnect yourself from it so much that it sounds like it could be anybody writing it. I mean, I like, when I'm reading a blog post, I like to see the person who's writing it, not necessarily them talking about what they do, because I don't really do that. I don't talk about myself a lot, but I think you can get a sense of my personality by reading the writing. So when you're doing informal writing, then write in a way that's more, where you're closer to the reader.

It's your voice. Yeah, yeah. Maybe you read Lewis, and Lewis has a certain voice. He has a way of talking. You read other writers, you tell there's a voice. You see it in the biblical writers. John, in his writing, sounds different than Paul, who sounds different than Peter. So there is a unique quality, even though they're not drawing attention to themselves

in inappropriate ways. Like, don't use exclamation points. I'm just saying, forget about exclamation. points forever, okay? Oh, I use them. I use them on blog posts. I'm just saying most people do not know how to use them anyway. I'm just sometimes.

I know you don't like them, Greg. That's okay. But that draws attention somewhat to the author in a way that's inappropriate. But anyway, but you still want your personality to come across. That's what you're saying. So, and then my last one would be, and you mentioned grabbing onto your ideas and not losing ideas, this is something I found, is that. that when I first have an idea and I write about it right then, the whole thing goes more quickly. I can finish it more quickly. I'm more excited about it. It just seems to flow better.

So as much as possible, when you have the idea, if you can write about it right then, that will help you. Get those things down, those basic nuggets. Well, I mean, not even that. I mean, that's the bare minimum. But if you are able to sit down and write the whole post, you know, just short, it doesn't have to be that long. But if you can sit down and write the post, right then, it just goes so much more smoothly. But at a minimum, make sure you get the idea. I think that's helpful. Incidental, maybe this is a post script here.

I mentioned the book already by Zinzer, Z-I-N-S-S-E-R, on writing well. I mentioned Stephen King on writing. Zinser's better if you're only going to read one. But you need to get strunken whites. elements of style. It's very small. Virtually every college student had to get one, and almost none of them ever read it. But it's going to be really helpful with knowing how stylistically to position your piece. And it's not flamboyant. It's just basic stuff, you know. And anyway, I'm just going to say that. And you had, there's another book you usually recommend about sticky ideas.

What's the name of that one again? Made to Stick. Okay. Made to Stick. Heath and Heath, A-T-A-T-H, like the Candy Boar. Heath and Heath, two brothers, made to stick. And notice the title is pretty sticky. That's why you got at least part of it. But they talk about, especially for public speaking, what is it about effective speakers that they're doing to make their ideas stick?

And they have five or six different characterizations. and so that's another good one to have in your library for both public speaking and writing. Excellent. Well, thank you so much, Dan. That was a great question. And I know a lot of people out there are interested in it. If you don't have a blog, go ahead and start one. We had fun with that one, too.

And one thing you said, Greg, is that it helps you to think more clearly. And I think that's really true. So even if nobody's reading what you're writing, you're still helping yourself to become a more systematic. clear thinker if you're writing. Exactly. All right. Thanks so much. If you have a question, send it on X with the hashtag STRASK or go to our website at

STR.org and find our hashtag STRASK podcast page for the link to send us your question. We really do look forward to hearing from you. This is Amy Hall and Greg Kokel for Stand to Reason.