I have a love/hate relationship with editing. After I completed the first draft of my manuscript, I really — really — didn’t enjoy the editing process. I found it tedious compared to the excitement of creating scenes and events while writing.

After a while, though, I started enjoying it more. There was a creativeness in editing that is different from drafting. There is a certain joy that comes from turning a clunky sentence or scene into a polished product that jumps off the page.

Recently, I was invited to help edit short stories for the Maryland Writers’ Association. This was for the association’s annual publication for young writers, so the authors were in middle school and high school. I jumped at the chance, and thoroughly enjoyed it!

I never got into writing until later in my life. Though I was always a voracious reader, the idea of writing my own story seemed out of reach. So it was exciting to see young people who are embracing their own creativity and taking the plunge into not only writing their stories, but sharing them with others.

I was the first editor, so my task was more developmental editing, not copyediting. I read the stories for clarity, cohesiveness, and general readability. As I marked up the stories, I also included my reasons for making suggestions. After all, this should also be a learning experience.

And I want to take a moment to note that some of these were truly amazing stories. Just an incredible amount of talent pouring off the page.

When I was done editing the stories, I realized something. I said to myself, “Self, do you follow your own advice?” That was a tough question. I opened my manuscript and looked through it with my hand partially covering my eyes, like they do in the movies.

Oof. Folks, lemme tell you: It is tough to realize that you have been dispensing advice that don’t follow yourself.

That’s when I made a decision: I set out on a month-long re-read/re-edit of my manuscript from start to finish. And this time, I would focus on basic issues. I did a word search for “had” to find I used passive verbs WAY too often. In other places, my descriptions were bland. There were far too many extraneous dialogue tags. And I found back-to-back chapters where little happened beyond conversations between the same two characters.

During this month-long quest, I cut the manuscript from 100,000 words to 94,000 words. That reduction came even though I added color and description throughout.

Eiting others helped me see my work in a new light. That editing part of my mind was sharpened for a little while, and I took advantage of it. I looked at my writing as if it was someone else’s work. I implemented the advice I gave to others. Or, to put it in the terms of an old parable, I identified both the speck in my neighbor’s eye as well as the log in my own.

If you are struggling to edit your manuscript, maybe reach out to a writing partner and volunteer to edit a few chapters of their work. Doing so sharpens your own skills, takes your mind off your own manuscript for a while, and you help out a friend. a win-win-win all around.