Anyone who writes- or knows someone who writes- knows the agony of editing and revising. They say it’s what separates writers from authors- well we’ll see. Right now however I feel like I am revising my life- don’t worry no character changes- just need a new point of view and better clarity on reality- or world building for how my life really is vs. how I want it to be. One thing I have found is when we edit and revise we are comparing our work, words, structure to something else- grammar rules, our critique partners thoughts and opinions, books we have read and loved or hated, the advice we got from our last class. And I find myself doing this too- comparing myself and my life to other people, people I know and ones on TV, single people, people who have written books filled with peaceful poetic prose about Zen and living in the now. And just like editing- I want to scream and hide under my bed and never come out. I think we need to be careful who and what we use to compare out lives and our work too. Using too many or too few sources can cause problems. Not being careful enough with who and what we trust can also cause issues- which leads to today’s video by Taylor Mali- a humours look at trusting spell check to edit your work.

What or who do you trust to compare your work and/or your life to?