My Writing Process: How I Succeed (or don't) By Being a "Heavy Reviser"

     In my four years of high school, never once did I truly get taught how to write well.  The only thing that was taught was the classic 5 paragraph essay with an introduction and a conclusion with three body paragraphs in the middle.  Now, I can easily find the reason why I write the way I do.  The following bullet points will explain what being a "Heavy Reviser" is really like.  

• What type of writer do I consider myself to be?

I consider myself to be a highly self-conscious writer, especially when it involves writing on topics and genres that I am not so familiar with.  Much like when I talk, in my writing I tend to ramble on and cannot seem to write my opinions clear and concise.  That being said, revising my first draft is normally a disaster.  Knowing that my ideas are scattered all over the place in one 5 paragraph essay, I am never confident in my work, even if I spent a great deal of time trying to make the final draft amazing.  

McPhee, Nic.  "2008-01-26 (Editing a paper)-31".  01/26/08 via Flikr.
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• What writing approaches does my writing process include? 

My writing normally has multiple drafts.  However, the first draft is always a mess.  My approach to writing usually starts off with just rambling off my ideas and trying to format those ideas into some kind of a 5 paragraph essay.  After the rambling, I use up the majority or the ink in my red pen and edit and revise until there are ideas clearly stated in an organized format.  That editing usually takes two or three drafts until I feel that the essay can be understood from someone else's point of view without leaving them confused or lost.  

• Does my writing process seem to be successful? What are the strengths and weaknesses of my approach?

In my experience with this writing approach, I seem to have a decent amount of success.  The times when I find that I don't have such great luck is when I don't have the time and effort that it takes to do all of the editing and revising.  It is a long process and it takes a lot of patience from me so it is hard for me to stay focused and really get all of the editions done.  However, when I do have the time and the patience to really do well and make sure the paper is as well done as possible, I have found that I do have a lot of success.  The strength that I find with my "Heavy Revising" approach is that I am never short on ideas to write about.  When I am able to ramble on about something, I find that many different topics or opinions come up that I would not have thought of had I just tried so hard to think of something off the top of my head.  I have found that taking things out is much easier than trying to add ideas in.  

• Would it be beneficial for me to try a different approach? 

As I mentioned earlier, this approach is how I have been writing for the past four years.  I have gotten used to writing down all my ideas and then finding what is important and what is not.  If I did try a different approach it may be to a "Heavy Planner".  This way I would be able to be constantly thinking of what to write about and then when the time comes to actually write the essay, I would be able to construct a more organized and clear essay.  However, I have a very short memory, so I don't know if I would be able to expand on those ideas without writing it all down and rambling on about it as I am used to doing.  It could be worth a shot to try out, although, I feel much more comfortable sticking with being the "Heavy Reviser" since I have taught myself to become a hard editor on my writing.