The Two-Paragraph Rule: Why I've Stopped Writing Blog Posts Like Homework
There's a draft in my folder called "The Big One". It's 3,400 words on creativity, the open web, and why we all need a personal site. I started it in the spring. I last touched it in July. It is, genuinely, quite good — and it will almost certainly never be published.
Then there's the note I wrote on a Tuesday lunchtime in October: two paragraphs about why my RSS feed had stopped working, what I changed, and a link to the fix. It took twenty minutes. It went out before my tea went cold. More people replied to that than to anything else I've posted this year.
That's the thing I keep coming back to. Somewhere along the line, blogging got a bit homeworky. Not for everyone, and not all the time — but the default has shifted. Every idea now seems to need a 2,000-word "ultimate guide". Every quick thought gets stretched into a listicle with a table of contents and an FAQ at the bottom. And every time I open my drafts folder, I see the same pattern: the epics are half-finished, and the short notes are the ones that actually shipped.
The drafts folder doesn't lie
My drafts folder is basically a museum of good intentions. There's "The Complete Guide to Indie Web..." (4,100 words, no ending). "22 Things I've Learned About..." (eleven things, no ending). "Why I'm Quitting..." (I didn't quit). Each one started with a burst of energy and then hit the same wall: the feeling that it needed to be bigger, more thorough, more... searchable.
Meanwhile, the posts that made it out the door are almost embarrassingly small. "Fixed the contact form." "New page for the projects I've abandoned." "A short note about a walk." Two paragraphs, sometimes three. A photo. Done. Those posts are the ones I still get emails about, because they were useful or human or both.
I'm not against long posts. Some ideas need room — a proper walkthrough, a real story, a piece of writing that earns its length. But length shouldn't be the default. It should be the exception, chosen because the idea needs it, not because the algorithm prefers it.
Reading on the bus, not on the sofa
Here's the test I've started using: would I read this on the bus? Not on a Sunday afternoon with a pot of tea and no plans — on the 42 into town, with one hand on a rail and the other holding my phone. If the answer is "I'd save it for later", it's probably too long. If the answer is "I'd read it now because it's short and I'm curious", it's probably about right.
That's not dumbing anything down. Some of the best things I've read online are short. A single observation, a clean explanation, a paragraph that makes you nod. The web is full of people writing 3,000-word essays to say what could be said in 300. I've been one of them. I'm trying to stop.
A few informal rules for knowing when a post is done
I don't have a system, exactly. But I've noticed a few things that help me decide when to hit publish and when to keep noodling.
1. If you can't say what it's about in one sentence, you're writing two posts
This one saves me every time. If I can't finish the sentence "This post is about..." without using the word "and" three times, I've got two posts, not one. Split them. Publish the first. The second can wait.
2. If you're adding a section because it "needs more words", stop
That's not writing. That's padding. It's the blog equivalent of adding a side salad to make a meal look bigger. Nobody's fooled, and the salad goes in the bin.
3. Publish when it's useful, not when it's exhaustive
A post that solves one problem today is better than a post that solves five problems next year. The "I'll finish it when I've covered everything" instinct is usually the instinct that kills the post.
4. Tuesday lunchtime is a valid publication time
I used to think posts needed a launch. A big day. A moment. Now I quite like publishing on a Tuesday lunchtime, when nobody's looking and the people who read it are probably eating a sandwich. It's less performative. More like a note passed under the door.
5. Read it on your phone. If you scroll more than twice, cut something
This is the most practical rule I've got. Open the draft on your phone, read it standing up, and see how it feels. If you're scrolling through your own post and losing interest, everyone else is too. Cut the bit you skimmed. You know which bit.
6. Keep a "done" list and a "maybe later" list
The "done" list is the important one. It's easy to forget the short posts that shipped. Keep a list. Look at it when you feel like you've written nothing. The "maybe later" list is where the epics go to nap. Some of them will wake up. Most won't. That's fine.
The short post is the honest post
There's a kind of honesty to a short post. It says: here's one thing, and I'm not going to dress it up. It respects the reader's time, and it respects the writer's, too. It doesn't pretend to be a definitive guide. It's a note from one person to another, sent when it was ready.
I'm not going to pretend I've cracked this. The Big One is still in my drafts folder, and I still open it sometimes. But more and more, I'm choosing the two-paragraph version. The one that fits on a screen. The one that goes out on a Tuesday, before the tea goes cold.
If you've got a draft folder full of epics, you're not alone. Maybe pick the smallest one. Finish it in twenty minutes. Publish it. See what happens. I think you'll be surprised how much people appreciate a short, sharp post — especially on the bus.
