Hemingway Was Right (and ChatGPT Can Help)

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Hemingway Was Right (and ChatGPT Can Help)

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TRANSCRIPT

Hi everybody and welcome back to the wonderful world of Everything is a Remix. I'm gonna try some new things. I'm experimenting. I don't know what I'm doing or where this is going.

I know I told some of you I'm retiring from video, I stopped the kinds of videos I was making. It's a new game for me, this is a new chapter. I'm going to be doing things in a way.

I want to tell you about an exciting new project I have and share one of the best parts of it right here.

I have a new course about ChatGPT and AI. You can watch the entire first module, which is 7 videos, over 25 minutes of content, for FREE. There's a link in the description.

AI is the next frontier in creativity. And the best tool there is... is ChatGPT.

What for? For writing and for writing content.

ChatGPT helps you deal with this.

The blank page. The void. The abyss. That relentless blinking cursor.

You can get spooked here. When you're starting from nothing, it's easy to get overwhelmed with choices or overthink or procrastinate.

Remember what I'm about to say. Make a note. Screencap.

Rewriting is easier than writing. I'll say it again: rewriting is easier than writing.

ChatGPT gives you something to work with. It's not good necessarily, it's just... something. It's a start.

Some of you might be thinking: doesn't your first draft need to be kinda like... good?

No no no. No, it really doesn't. Common misconception.

Don't believe me?

How about the author Jane Smiley? She won the Pulitzer Prize. She said.

"Every first draft is perfect because all the first draft has to do is exist."

How about Anne Lamott? She wrote a famous book about writing called Bird by Bird.

"Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere."

Or most famously, Earnest Hemingway might have said "The first draft of anything is s--t."

We're not totally quite sure he said exactly that.

The first draft is often bad. Just like the first demo of a song is bad or the alpha version of your software is bad or the first prototype of your product is bad.

Thinking that the first draft has to be good will paralyze you. It'll stop you from starting.

ChatGPT can get you that crappy first draft, it can give you the raw material. Then you have to rewrite it pretty much completely. There won't be much ChatGPT left in it when you're done.

Sound like a lot of work? It's way less work than writing your own first draft and then making that better.

I'll say it again, rewriting is easier than writing.

When there is something there on the page, you can improve it and fix it.

And sure, sometimes ChatGPT will strike out. No matter what you do, its first draft will be a dud, you won't be able to use it. Was that a waste of time?

No, you still come out ahead. Because seeing what you don't want can shed light on what you do want. It's helped you narrow down the possibilities.

In sports, there's the expression "You're either winning or you're learning." Same applies here. Even when you lose with an attempt at a first draft, you learn, and you get closer to a solution.