The HBR Guides Collection (8 Books) (HBR Guide Series)

13

Chapter 3

Divide the writing

process into four

separate tasks

Do you feel anxious every time you sit down to write?

Your main diffi culty is probably fi guring out how to

begin. Don’t try to picture the completed piece before

you’ve gathered and organized your material. It’s much

too soon to think about the fi nal, polished product—and

you will just make the challenge ahead of you seem over-

whelming. The worry can take more out of you than the

actual writing.

Instead, break up your work. Think of writing not as

one huge task but as a series of smaller tasks. The poet,

writer, and teacher Betty Sue Flowers has envisioned

them as belonging to different ...