Polish! Polish! Polish!

Up, down, no, too low, up a fraction. My feet need to be flat on the floor under the chair. That’s what I read somewhere.

The keyboard feels wrong to me. Closer? No. Further? No.
The window needs to be open for the fresh air. Half or full?
Fly! Darn that fly! I’ll have to swat it, or it will annoy me.
Why is the chair tipping me forward?
Who’s been sitting in my chair?
What’s my login, again?
Ok, now, where was I?
Ahh, yes, polishing.

If you’re doing it right, the last 10% can take longer than the first 90.

The last 10% is where the value gets unlocked, the story gets dialled in, and the mic drop is earned.

If you do the last 10% correctly, the reader will say, “Wow, that’s so simple. Why didn’t someone think of that before?”

I felt that way reading Fresh Water for Flowers by Valerie Perrin this week.
(I just moved the keyboard forward again)

The book looks through the eyes of a French cemetery keeper. It’s a brilliant premise, one I wish I had thought of! How does someone come up with such a delightfully simple angle?

Back to the polishing…

Kerrie and I reached a 90% milestone this week, albeit Kerrie thought it was more like 80%—a classic case of the creative versus scientific mind.

My 90% didn’t indicate that I had written nine-tenths of the words or that I had burned through the same portion of hours. I was sending up a big, green flag that I was ready to dive into the toughest phase of a project—the final 10%, the above-and-beyond 10%.

Starting is easy.

I’m always excited for the chance of a new start, the opportunity to throw down the clay onto the wheel. The anticipation of a new pot, wondering of the curves that may emerge from under my fingertips.

I am practised enough to make early progress fast.

Kerrie and I spent a few hours fleshing out the outline of a briefing document for a new project. We brainstormed the chunks of information that we thought needed to be in the document. They were rough ideas, obvious and logical, listed on a page.

I took a few high-order topics – the purpose, objectives, and outcomes – and drafted text for Kerrie’s review. It helped set the direction for the more significant chunk of writing to come.

This stuff is easy. I’ve done it countless times before.

I locked myself away in my office, with no window open or flies then, only winter chill, and wrote.

A few days of drafting, then revisions, and repeat.

Getting to the 90% mark takes time and mental energy, mixed with a lot of picking up and putting down. Tweak the words here, insert another piece of the puzzle there, twist that sentence 45 degrees and it magically slots into place.

Completing 90% of a puzzle is immensely satisfying. I love how a jumble of weirdly shaped and coloured cardboard cutouts can transform into an intricate artwork.

Putting those last pieces in place is the ultimate victory over chaos.

But writing, in the real world, isn’t like that.

Those last pieces—well, they’re always missing. Your kid or the previous owner has put them in the bin, their mouths, under the lounge, or in the garden to help flowers grow.

You have to create those last pieces from scratch.

Of course, you could call it quits right there and then. Ninety percent done on the good-better-best scale is great. Heck, I’m always stoked to score 90% at anything.

Fix a few grammatical errors, tighten the sentences, and we’re done.

Except, well, except for the inescapable truth. A lesson I’ve learned too often the hard way.

The value is in the final 10%.

That’s when you show the reader you care enough to go above and beyond. That’s when you give the client the quality of work they deserve.

That’s when you realise that the concept you’re explaining has a vital role to play in building community that are free of domestic and family violence. It deserves everything I’ve got.

The final 10% is the part where I ensure that the concept will land and inspire a stranger to feel excited about it too—excited for a new beginning, a new era.

Dig deep and sweat the final 10%, I tell myself. It’s worth it.