The first draft exists to teach the second draft what the idea actually meant.

The first version is a research instrument, not an attempt at the finished thing. You do not fully know what you mean until you have watched yourself try to say it, and the draft’s real output is that discovery rather than its sentences. Judging it as a product misreads its job.

Write the first pass quickly and expect to keep very little. When you reread, look for the idea underneath rather than for lines to salvage. Then start again with what you have learned, which is usually faster than repairing something built on a misunderstanding.