Hey, hi, hello!

If you haven't read this week's Email Paradise (EP), you miiiiight be a lil out of the loop (go read it!!!!) but this is the fourth (!!!) edition of a bonus add-on where I share the psych behind the creative writing prompt shared earlier in the week.

Reminder of this week's prompt in case you haven't done it yet:

And now for the Psych Behind It 👇🏼

1. You're training your brain to see in layers. Often times, we read the words we write with a very narrow focus in mind: Does it make sense? Does it say the thing I needed to say? That's it.
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   And while that's a great STARTING point, we want to train ourselves to go one step further and ask, 'Where can I make this more entertaining for the reader?' (so they read what you write!) It's a perceptual shift that lets you start seeing the sensory gaps in real time to make your writing more expressive.
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2. Revision-as-practice removes the stakes. If you're trying to write something from scratch, there's often Blank Page Anixtey of trying to focus on writing something meaningful.
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   By reworking something you've already shared with the world, it makes it easier to get started, you can make it stronger and lower the pressure when the goal is simply to practice. You're building the muscle in a low-consequence context so your brain will automatically start seeking moments to infuse it into your writing during high-consequence ones.
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3. You're building a new proofreading reflex. Every time you do this pass, you're reinforcing the association between "abstract emotion word" and "find the body equivalent." Eventually that fires during drafting, not after. The practice is temporary scaffolding* for a permanent cognitive habit.
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   *a temporary structure used in construction, maintenance, and repair work to safely support workers, tools, and materials at elevated heights​
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4. You're learning to translate the abstract into the physical. Which is a powerful skill to have. "Buy this because it will make you feel relieved" is abstract. "Buy this and exhale a sigh of relief for the first time in months" is physical. You're taking an internal state and finding its external, sensory equivalent, which automatically makes your writing stronger, more relatable, and more enjoyable to read.

Because as we all know, the words you write are only going to convert if someone FINISHES READING THEM. And this creative exercise is a great way to start (:

Would love to know if you tried this out, and if you want to share what came up, I'd LOVE to read it! <3

Catch ya on the next wave,