I haven't seen a thread on this yet, so sorry in advance if there is already one out there :S I have a terrible habit of throwing in the word 'just' JUST (heh) to fill the void. It's subconscious. Are there any better ways of approaching removing this word from my general context without removing the proper use of it (merely)? Thanks in advance!
I use just all the time, but my current story is told from the 1st person, so it makes sense because it forms part of their way of speaking / thinking. In 3rd person, or even 2nd, I don't think it should be used as often as a space filler. You could replace it with other words such as only. I have a terrible habit of throwing in the word 'just' only to fill the void. Also, just (ha!) write it in as you lay out your first draft, and then go back and remove any that are not required.
Don't worry about it in your first draft. When you are editing, search for the word and in each case decide whether it needs removing, replacing or leaving alone. You've already identified the issue, which is the hard bit.
It doesn't matter what the word is. If you like discover you are like throwing it in habitually, you should like train yourself out of it. People do the same thing with public speaking, and the habits often carry over to their writing. If you do any public speaking training, you become conscious of those "hesitation words" and teach yourself not to inject them. By all means remove them during revision, but isn't it better to not put them in to begin with?
It's probably down to individual writing style. Many writers prefer to silence their "inner editor" whilst getting their first draft down, and trying to train themselves to use certain words less would work against that, which is why I don't suggest it at that stage of writing. Of course, it's likely that looking for and dealing with those words in the subsequent editing would be just the sort of training you'd like to see. Do it enough and it's likely to be reflected in future work simply because one's instinctive style has changed for the better -- handling those words better will have become internalised.
i often have to stop myself from typing 'just' and force myself to substitute 'only' or 'merely' or 'simply' for it... or rewriting the sentence to not need any of 'em!
This is what I'm looking for, I mainly want to kick out the word before it gets any more fluent than it is. Then I'll tie that into writing
