Editing to death?

There's a secret about editing that I'd like to share with you - you may have even heard this little secret before, but even if you have, the saying bears repeating:

Editing can ruin your work.



What?

Or more directly, too much editing can ruin your work.

Perhaps you know what I'm talking about. Because your work is 'never good enough' you keep putting it through the ringer to get every 'problem' fixed. You work, not only on paragraphs, but lines, making sure each and every one would make your English teacher proud.

And in the interim?

You lose you.

You lose your writing voice, your style, the way YOU only you can put a sentence together. And what you have left is the shell of what you once wrote.

Don't do it.

Edit, yes. But edit and leave it alone.

I mean it.

It will be one of the best decisions you've ever made.