MYTH: You Need to Make Yourself Sound Smart

We live in a culture addicted to making ourselves look smarter than someone else. It’s one of the reason we have internet trolls. Everyone’s trying to outdo someone else, “one-up ‘em” as they say.

A lot of my clients worry if they are going to sound “smart” in their books. Sometimes they over-correct because of this particular form of Word Anxiety. I’ve seen projects go awry over this issue. Authors get fixated on how they sound and they end up self-sabotaging their work.

Here’s a surprising truth in writing, especially nonfiction writing:

As an author, it’s not your job to sound smart.

It’s your job to make the reader FEEL smart.

So here’s two examples of how I’ve handled this issue.

EXAMPLE 1

Client: “I love Malcolm Gladwell. He’s so smart! I want my readers to recognize my intelligence.”

Me: “Yeah, I love Gladwell’s writing too. Fun fact…did you know he only writes on a ninth and tenth grade level in his books?”

Client: (confused, doubtful look) “No, that can’t be true…really?”

Me: “Yes. The smartest thing Gladwell does in his writing is make the reader feel smart.”

After I said this, I think I saw an actually ghostly lightbulb turn on over the client’s head. And once they realized they didn’t need to “sound” smart but could write at a tenth grade level for their ideal reader, it freed up a lot of their anxiety in the book writing process.

EXAMPLE 2

Real life client conversation I had very recently:

Me: “You’re going to have to dumb this down a bit for your reader.”

I said this to one of my most brilliant clients ever. Seriously, this person’s intelligence is through the roof.

But their message was getting lost in the brilliance. In their desire to display their intelligence, they had overdone it. Left unchanged, their book would unintentionally isolate and demean the reader.

We weren’t “dumbing” down their ideas, just the words to present those ideas. This way, the ideas could shine by being crystal clear to their ideal reader.

If your ideal reader is a busy CEO or executive (or working mom or overworked accountant…), consider how hectic their brains already are. They don’t really want to think hard when they’re reading.

The first time they have to re-read a sentence to understand what you mean, they’ll put the book down…and pick up someone else’s.

Instead, make the reader feel smart.

It’s the smartest thing you can do.