Who Is Your Reader?

Spend some time journaling about your reader. Who is your reader? Who do you write to? Do you think about someone speci c when you write? Look through whatever you’re writing and circle or highlight any jargon or other words that might not mean much to some readers, supposing they don’t know a specific discipline or don’t speak a certain language, for example. Notice whether you’ve denied such terms or not, when you’ve included them.

Contemplate whether you want to make your writing more teacherly, in order to bring in more readers. The answer doesn’t have to be yes. But in general, contemplate your own intentions in terms of who you are imagining you are writing to and make sure your work serves these intentions as best you can. If for example you feel you’re writing to ‘anybody’, try being more realistic about who that anybody might be.

Try reading through your own writing with a sort of foolish mind, pretending you do not know yourself or anything that you know, and be honest about whether you can understand anything that’s happening.