Why Are We So Afraid of the First Draft, and Does Every Story Need to Be Published?: Purpose Before Pressure Publishing
“What if the greatest obstacle to writing isn’t the absence of something to say, but the belief that everything we write must be worthy of an audience?”
— T. DeSmith
Think about that for a second. How
many stories have never made it past the first paragraph? How many poems have been abandoned because the words didn’t sound right the first time? How many people have convinced themselves that they aren’t good writers simply because their first attempt didn’t resemble something they would find on a bookshelf? And perhaps the bigger question is, when did we start treating the first draft like it was supposed to be the final product?
I find this conversation interesting because writing is one of the few creative processes where we sometimes expect ourselves to produce something meaningful, organized, grammatically correct, and emotionally compelling all at once.
We want the introduction to capture attention. We want every sentence to flow. We want the message to make sense. And somewhere between trying to find the perfect words and questioning whether anybody would even care to read them, we forget why we wanted to write in the first place.
But what if the first draft isn’t supposed to impress anybody?
What if it’s simply supposed to exist?
The Fear of Writing Something Imperfect. There’s something interesting about the relationship between writing and fear. We often associate the fear of writing with a lack of confidence or ability. But research suggests that writing apprehension is a legitimate subject of study, not simply an excuse people make when they struggle to begin.
In 1975, researchers John A. Daly and Michael D. Miller developed an instrument to measure writing apprehension, examining the anxiety people experience in connection with writing.
Their research established a foundation for studying how people feel about writing and the ways those feelings can be measured. Now, that doesn’t mean every hesitant writer is afraid of criticism, nor does it mean that writing anxiety affects everybody in the same way. But it does raise an interesting question. If our feelings about writing influence our willingness to begin, how many ideas might never reach the page because we’ve already decided they won’t be good enough? Think about the writer who has an incredible idea but continuously deletes the opening sentence. Or the poet who changes a line repeatedly because it doesn’t sound sophisticated enough.
Or the person who has spent years wanting to write a book but keeps waiting until they feel qualified to call themselves an author.
At what point does wanting to create something good become the very thing preventing us from creating anything at all? And I want to be clear there is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting your writing to be good. There is nothing wrong with caring about grammar, organization, structure, or the way your words are received. But I do believe there’s a difference between wanting to improve your writing and refusing to give yourself permission to write imperfectly. One encourages growth. The other can leave an idea sitting untouched for years. The First Draft Was Never the Finish Line Here’s something I think more aspiring writers deserve to understand, writing isn’t necessarily a straight line from beginning to end. In 1981, researchers Linda Flower and John R. Hayes introduced their cognitive process theory of writing. Their work challenged the idea that writing happens through one simple, fixed sequence.
Instead, they described writing as an interconnected process involving planning, translating thoughts into language, and reviewing what has been written. These processes can occur repeatedly and in different orders throughout the writing experience. In other words, a writer may begin with an idea, write a paragraph, reconsider the direction, revise a sentence, discover something new, and return to the original plan.
And that’s part of the process.
So why do we sometimes treat revision as evidence that we didn’t write well enough the first time?
Why do we look at a messy draft and immediately question our ability instead of recognizing that we’re still developing the work?
Maybe the problem isn’t that our first drafts are imperfect. Maybe the problem is that we’ve mistaken the beginning of the process for the standard of the finished product.
I think about this from both an author’s and a publisher’s perspective.
There are different responsibilities attached to different stages of writing. Creating a manuscript is not the same as preparing one for publication. Editing, proofreading, formatting, and designing a book all serve important purposes. They help transform a manuscript into something readers can engage with.
But those responsibilities don’t all have to exist in the moment when someone is simply trying to get an idea onto a page.
Sometimes the sentence needs to be written before it can be improved.
Sometimes the story needs to be explored before it can be organized.
And sometimes the writer needs the freedom to discover what they’re actually trying to say. A Finished Draft Isn’t Necessarily a Finished Manuscript
Now, here’s where I want to introduce something that I think aspiring authors should understand before entering the publishing process.
Finishing a manuscript and preparing a manuscript for publication are two different accomplishment. You can finish writing a book and still have significant work ahead of you.
And that doesn’t diminish what you’ve already achieved. A completed first draft may contain inconsistencies in the plot, underdeveloped characters, unclear transitions, repeated information, or chapters that no longer serve the direction of the story.
For nonfiction writers, there may be claims that require additional research, arguments that need stronger evidence, or sections that would benefit from restructuring.
For poets, the revision process might involve examining imagery, rhythm, line breaks, organization, or the relationship between individual pieces in a collection.
These are not necessarily signs that someone lacks writing ability.
They’re considerations that arise when transforming an initial draft into a more developed manuscript.
And this is where understanding different types of editing becomes important. Developmental editing examines the larger structure of a manuscript, including its organization, content, pacing, and overall direction.
Copyediting generally focuses on clarity, consistency, grammar, punctuation, and style. Proofreading typically occurs near the end of production, when the manuscript has already undergone substantial editing and the goal is to catch remaining errors.
These services serve different purposes, and not every manuscript requires the same level of intervention.
But I wonder how many aspiring authors enter the publishing process without understanding these distinctions how many believe that finishing the final chapter means their book should immediately go to print?
And how many become discouraged when an editor identifies areas that still need work? I think we need to normalize the idea that revision isn’t a punishment for writing poorly. It’s an opportunity to examine whether the manuscript is accomplishing what the writer intended. Because a first draft answers one question: What have I written? Revision introduces another Is this the most effective way to communicate it? And publishing asks something different altogether Is this work ready to be presented to readers?
Those questions are connected, but they are not interchangeable.
But Does Every Story Need to Be Published? Now, this is where I want to challenge the conversation a little further. We spend so much time discussing how to publish a book that we sometimes overlook an equally important question. Does every piece of writing need to become a published work? Think about personal journals, private letters, family memories, unfinished stories, and poems written during particular moments in someone’s life.
These forms of writing can serve purposes that have nothing to do with commercial publishing. A person may write to document an experience they don’t want to forget. Someone else may write to organize their thoughts before making a decision. Another person may keep a journal because they enjoy having a private record of their life. And sometimes people write simply because they enjoy the process.
There’s also research that examines the potential psychological benefits of expressive writing. In a 2023 meta analysis published in the British Journal of Clinical Psychology, researcher Lin Guo examined 31 randomized experimental studies involving 4,012 participants. The analysis found that expressive writing had a small but statistically significant overall effect on reducing symptoms of depression, anxiety, and stress among the healthy and subclinical populations studied. The findings are worth considering, but they require context. The measured effect was small, and the results do not mean that writing is automatically therapeutic for everyone. Still, this research contributes to a broader conversation about what writing can accomplish outside traditional publishing.
We recognize writing as a skill, an academic requirement, a profession, and an artistic practice. But how often do we acknowledge writing as an activity that can have value without ever becoming a finished product for public consumption? There is a difference between writing something meaningful and deciding that it belongs in the marketplace.
And I think both decisions deserve consideration. Just Because a Story Is Written, Does That Mean It’s Ready to Be Published? This is probably one of the most important questions I want aspiring authors to consider. Because I don’t believe the decision to publish should be based solely on whether someone has completed a manuscript….
A story can be personally meaningful and still require substantial development before publication.
A writer can have an important message but struggle to communicate it clearly. A manuscript can contain valuable information while also including factual inaccuracies that need to be corrected. And a deeply personal story can raise questions about privacy, consent, and the experiences of other people mentioned in the work. These considerations become especially important in memoirs, autobiographies, and nonfiction writing. Imagine someone writing a memoir about a difficult family experience.
The writer may have every intention of sharing their perspective, but publishing that manuscript could also involve revealing information about relatives, friends, or other individuals.
That doesn’t automatically mean the story shouldn’t be published. But it does mean the writer may need to consider how to handle identifying details, sensitive information, factual claims, and potential consequences.
Similarly, an author writing an educational book may have a compelling argument, but that argument still needs credible evidence. And a fiction writer may have an imaginative concept that requires further development before readers can fully understand the world they’ve created.
This is why I believe the publishing conversation should involve more than simply asking whether a manuscript is complete.
We should also be discussing readiness, responsibility, and intention. Because publication doesn’t automatically improve a manuscript. It makes the manuscript available to an audience.
And those are two very different things. When Is a Story Ready for the Public? I don’t think there’s one universal answer to this question.
Different genres have different expectations. Different readers approach books with different interests. And different authors have different goals. But there are questions writers can ask themselves before moving forward.
Has the manuscript undergone a meaningful revision process?
Is the intended audience clear?
Are the ideas organized in a way that supports the purpose of the work?
If the manuscript includes factual information, have important claims been verified? If it discusses real people, have privacy and other relevant ethical or legal considerations been addressed?
And perhaps most importantly, does the author understand what publication will involve? Because publishing is more than making a book available for purchase.
Depending on the publishing path, it can involve editing, design, production, distribution, marketing, and ongoing decisions about how the work is presented. An author may choose traditional publishing, independent publishing, or another approach based on their goals and circumstances. Each option comes with its own responsibilities and considerations.
And while I believe publishing should be accessible to people with stories they want to share, accessibility shouldn’t eliminate the importance of preparation. We can encourage aspiring authors while still being transparent about the work involved.
We can celebrate completing a manuscript without pretending that every completed manuscript is ready for immediate publication. And we can recognize the value of private writing without suggesting that publication is unnecessary. Those ideas can coexist. What Should We Expect From the Publishing Process?As a publishing company, I think there’s also a responsibility to educate writers about the process they’re entering.
An aspiring author shouldn’t have to pretend to understand every stage of publishing before asking for assistance. That’s part of why professional guidance exists.
But guidance should involve more than telling someone what they want to hear. Sometimes a manuscript needs another round of revisions.
Sometimes a writer needs additional research. Sometimes the organization of a book needs to be reconsidered.
And sometimes an author may realize that the publishing timeline they originally imagined isn’t realistic for the amount of work remaining.
These conversations aren’t always exciting, but they’re necessary.
Because the goal shouldn’t simply be to produce a book as quickly as possible. The goal should be to make informed decisions about the work being created and the way it’s presented.
And I think there’s something valuable about giving writers enough information to understand those decisions for themselves. Not every author will agree with every editorial suggestion. Not every manuscript needs to follow the same creative formula. And not every writer will define success through the same outcomes. But understanding the process gives authors an opportunity to participate in it more intentionally.
That matters. Before the Book, There Was a Draft I want to return to where we started. The unfinished sentence.
The deleted paragraph. The manuscript that has been sitting in a folder for months. The writer who keeps promising themselves they’ll begin when they have more time, more experience, or a better understanding of what they’re doing.
I wonder how differently we would approach writing if we understood the first draft as one part of a much larger process.
Not a final examination of our abilities.
Not a publishing contract waiting to happen. Not a product that needs to be marketable from the moment we begin. But an initial attempt to develop something that may change significantly along the way. I also wonder whether we’d make more thoughtful publishing decisions if we stopped assuming that every writing project must eventually become a book. Some manuscripts will be revised and published. Some will remain personal. Some will be transformed into entirely different projects. And others may teach their writers something valuable before being set aside.
I don’t think we need to assign the same outcome to every piece of writing in order to recognize its significance.
At Purpose Before Pressure Publishing, we believe in the importance of developing manuscripts with intention, understanding the publishing process, and respecting the different purposes writing can serve.
Because there’s a difference between encouraging someone to write and encouraging someone to publish.
And I believe we need to understand both. Maybe the first draft was never supposed to prove how well we could write. Maybe it was supposed to give us permission to discover what we had to say. And maybe the value of a story was never determined by how many people got to read it, but by what it meant to the person brave enough to write it.
So before you decide whether your manuscript is ready for publication, consider if you’ve actually finished developing your story, or have you simply finished writing it? And if you never choose to publish it, does that automatically mean the writing was for nothing? I’ll leave those questions for you to answer.
Your voice is your power. Your story has purpose.
— Purpose Before Pressure Publishing
Research & References
1. Daly, J. A., & Miller, M. D. (1975). The Empirical Development of an Instrument to Measure Writing Apprehension. Research in the Teaching of English, 9(3), 242–249.
2. Flower, L., & Hayes, J. R. (1981). A Cognitive Process Theory of Writing. College Composition and Communication, 32(4), 365–387.
3. Guo, L. (2023). The Delayed, Durable Effect of Expressive Writing on Depression, Anxiety and Stress: A Meta-Analytic Review of Studies With Long-Term Follow-Ups. British Journal of Clinical Psychology, 62(1), 272–297.
4. East Carolina University, Writing Across the Curriculum. Teaching Writing as a Process.
Comments