If editing your own work is tricky, proofreading your own work is trickier yet.

Proofreading focuses on minute details like these:

• Is this word spelled right?
• Should there be a comma here or a semicolon?
• Is it correct to capitalize these job titles?
• Do I even know all the questions I should be asking?

To catch our own mistakes, we need another pair of eyes – one that isn’t connected to the brain that planned, drafted, revised, and edited this material.

I’m a professional writer and editor. Still, I hire a proofreader – really an editor with strong proofreading skills – for this e-letter. (You could hire her, too.)

Even then, before this e-letter – or any work I edit – goes to the proofreader, I proof it myself. You should do the same. The more of our own mistakes we catch, the easier it is for the proofreader to catch the rest.

When you can’t hire a proofreader, proofing your own work – and enlisting the help of colleagues – becomes even more important.

I’ve shared every idea I’ve ever had about how to proofread in previous posts. Try these 6 + 6 ways to save face. And remember that one day makes all the difference.

The main takeaway I want you to have, as we wrap up this series on the 5-step writing process, is that proofreading and drafting are separate steps.

Too many of us learned in school that “writing” consists of making your work correct. That is, we learned to focus on the last two steps of the writing process, editing and proofreading.

Those steps are important, but so are planning, drafting, and revising!

If you treat the 5 steps as separate processes – and particularly if you take time to plan first and then draft quickly, without judgment – writing will get faster and easier for you.

I promise.