If you wrote it, deleted it, and rewrote it five times, that draft is telling you something about the situation.

REFLECTION

WHAT THIS MEANS

The trouble is usually not in the wording. A message that will not come out right is generally pointing at something unresolved underneath: you are asking for something you do not want to admit you need, or you are angry and trying to sound fine. No arrangement of words fixes that, which is why the fifth attempt is no better than the first. The difficulty is the information.

Stop editing and ask what you actually want to happen. Write the blunt version nobody will see, then decide whether the honest thing belongs in a message at all. Some of these are conversations.

A QUESTION TO SIT WITH

Which message did you rewrite five times before sending it?

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