The First Draft Is The Thinking Draft
Not of my own coinage, alas.
The title of this post is an excellent, excellent line, and how I wish I had thought of it. But alas, it is twice removed. I first read about it in Ravi Shankar Iyer's excellent newsletter, which you should certainly sign up for (scroll to the bottom of the page, and enter your email address).
But he himself learnt about it in an excellent blog post over on Ann Handley's blog. ANd both Ravi and Ann are talking about a point we discussed in yesterday's post, about using AI in writing. That point being, how much of our writing should be outsourced to AI?
And each of our answers may vary, but it would seem all three of us are agreed upon one thing: the first draft is sacred. That first draft shouldn't be outsourced to AI, because that is where the thinking happens.
And if you have written enough, you know exactly what I mean. It is a mistake to assume that all of your thinking happens before you put pen to paper (or fingers to a keyboard). At least part of your thinking, and if you are truly lucky, most of your thinking, happens when you are in the very act of writing.
It is as if a part of your brain comes alive because you are putting your thoughts down, and begins to engage with what is being written. This part of your brain thinks about what is being written, argues with what is being written, and therefore makes it better. Oftentimes, you realize what you really wanted to say only when you begin to write it down, and every now and then, you touch upon a rich vein of thought because of this process. Those are the very best days, but they come by very rarely, alas.
But regardless of what stage of exaltation you reach while writing, the fact remains that it is at this stage that your thinking about what you are going to write truly comes alive. And which is why Ann's line is such an excellent one - because it captures why writing the first draft is so important. Sacrificing this thinking that happens, at the altar of convenience, is too high an opportunity cost.
One minor caveat: Your first draft can absolutely be a very long and detailed prompt that you feed into the AI. It is not as if your first draft has to be the one that you work upon. It can absolutely be a rough and ready outline that you work upon while you type (or even dictate) it out.
Others may disagree, of course, and I certainly don't mean to propose this as a rule or law. All I'm saying is that it (to me) makes perfect sense to have the first draft be one that only the AI ever sees.
Perhaps an example will help. "Help me write a blog post about how industrial policy is being implemented in India" is a bad prompt for a variety of reasons, but for the purposes of what we are speaking about today, it is a bad draft because you are outsourcing the thinking about the topic to the AI.
And given the state of AI today, it actually will come up with a pretty good outline, or a pretty good first pass at the blog post. You may then edit it, refine it, and add to it, sure - but you are using the scaffolding constructed by the AI. Far better for that first draft to be your actual thinking about the issue.
"Help me write a blog post about industrial policy in India. I would like to focus in this essay on the history of industrial policy in general, with the focus then moving on to industrial policy for those nations that succeeded in using this policy in Asia in the 20th century.
The next section should be about the kind of industrial policy that India adopted prior to 1991, and how well that worked out for us, especially in a comparative sense with those Asian nations that succeeded in their industrial policies.
Include a section next about how our industrial policy started to change post 1991, and how both the financial crisis of 2008 and the pandemic necessitated changes in our industrial policy, particularly focussing on resilient supply chains, and the China+1 strategy.
Finally, focus on the current lacunae in our policy, especially focussing on how export discipline is a crucial, but missing ingredient"
This is still very far away from being a first draft, but just writing this out off the top my head has given be ideas. I may want to restructure the order a bit, or I may want to think about a good hook, may want to cite some authors, some publications and some papers. As I continue to think about what else should go into this essay, I end up making my first draft/prompt even better - and that process should continue for as long as possible. And sure, at whatever stage you feel necessary, feel free to trot out your AI of choice, and watch the magic unfold.
But prior to all this remains the first, crucial ingredient - your stamp of thought over your own piece. And again, that stamp of your thought is only possible when you write out the first draft. Guard that part of the process with all you've got, and never give that bit up, no matter how strong the temptation.
The first draft is the thinking draft.
Whatay line!