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Q&A Ways to avoid repetition of "filler" words in writing?

I can see several possibilities here: Don't worry about it. Perhaps your "overuse" of these words is simply part of your style. Or perhaps it isn't overuse at all. Ask a few good readers to read ...

posted 8y ago by Dale Hartley Emery‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T05:52:16Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/25799
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Dale Hartley Emery‭ · 2019-12-08T05:52:16Z (almost 5 years ago)
I can see several possibilities here:

1. Don't worry about it. Perhaps your "overuse" of these words is simply part of your style. Or perhaps it isn't overuse at all. Ask a few good readers to read your story and give you feedback.

2. Make a list of the words you're concerned about. After you finish a first draft, search for each word. Make a conscious decision what to do about it (delete the word, leave the sentence alone, rewrite the sentence to make the word unnecessary). Make notes about how you decide which to retain, which to remove, and which to revise.

3. Here's an experiment. Take a section of something you've written. Maybe 500–1000 words.

4. Another experiment. For the next two weeks, when you finish each writing session, search for the trouble words and eliminate them, revising as necessary. After two weeks, go back and restore the ones you really want to restore. Make notes about how you decide which ones to restore and which ones to omit. This tells you about your personal style.

5. Consider how you could use these words to characterize your characters. What kind of character would overuse "actually" in conversation? What kind of character would overuse "actually" in private thoughts or narration? What other words might a given character overuse?

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2017-01-02T21:28:32Z (almost 8 years ago)
Original score: 4