Brevity in writing is what charity is to all other virtues—righteousness is nothing without the one, nor authorship without the other.

Readers give you a limited amount of attention and no more. Whatever else your writing has going for it, the reader has to still be there when it arrives, and length is the most common reason they are not. Brevity is what makes the other qualities count, in the way that a certain warmth is what makes the other virtues bearable in a person.

So cut before you polish. Take out the introduction that explains what you are about to say, the examples after the first good one, and the closing paragraph that restates everything. What survives will be read, and being read is the whole point.