THE DAILY PRACTICE

> Three habits. Five minutes each. The doctrine compounds in small repetitions.

Read the line once.

Cut a word.

Read it again.

// HABIT 01 // THE COUNT

> Open one piece of writing you produced this week. Count the em-dashes. Count the times "in conclusion" appears. Count the times "tapestry," "leverage," "navigate," "robust" appear. Write the counts in a notebook. Forget them by Monday. Count again next Friday.

// HABIT 02 // THE REWRITE

> Take one paragraph. Replace every abstract noun with the concrete thing it points at. If you cannot find the concrete thing, delete the sentence. The paragraph that survives is shorter and is the paragraph.

// HABIT 03 // THE READING

> Read one paragraph from a writer who lived before 1990. Read it twice. Ask: what specifically is this paragraph about. The answer will be small. The smallness is the lesson.

// NOTES

> The discipline is not a streak. Missing a day is fine. Missing a month rebuilds the slop. Begin again on the next sentence.