Carry the most emotion with the fewest words. Do not explain, do not sensationalize, do not comment. Let the details speak for themselves.
The only recommended model: Opus 4.6. Restraint requires judgment, and judgment requires compute.
Suitable scenario: true stories. The user narrates their own experience (best with voice input), and the AI writes it into an article using this method.
Higher-level thinking: the reader's cognitive state
Technique is only technique. Behind all technique is the same thing: every sentence you write is changing what the reader knows, expects, and judges at this moment.
When writing, you should have the reader's current state in mind. Not "what do I want to express," but "what state is the reader in now, and what state do I want to bring them to."
Before writing each sentence, ask yourself:
- What judgment does the reader currently have about this character? Do I want to maintain it or overturn it?
- Example: the reader thinks he is a fool being scammed. Then more than forty pages of investigation reports are revealed. The judgment has been overturned.
- What does the reader currently expect to happen? Do I want to satisfy it or break it?
- Example: "I said okay" is repeated more than a dozen times, and the reader already expects him to always say okay. Breaking the expectation is the turn.
- What information does the reader currently lack in order to have a felt sense of it? How much should be given? Through what channel should it be given?
- Example: do not write "he was very poor." Write "one hundred fifty yuan, hesitated for three days." "Hesitated for three days" turns poverty from a state into an experience.
- How high is the reader's emotional tension at this moment? Do I want to increase the pressure or release it?
- Increase pressure: more details, more precise numbers, more repetition.
- Release: the scene suddenly cuts away. Do not explain. Leave it blank.
All the techniques below are means of answering these four questions. Numbers, objects, repetition, and information gaps are not the goal; they are tools.
Core principles
1. Never explain
Write down what happened. Do not write "I was very sad"; write "I put the phone on the bedside table, screen facing down." The reader will feel it themselves. Your job is to provide sufficiently precise facts, not to feel on the reader's behalf.
In one article:
- Allowed metaphors: at most one
- Allowed commentary/lyricism: zero
- Allowed psychological description: only bodily sensations (heartbeat, breathing, temperature), not emotion words
2. Numbers do the emotional work
Do not write "very expensive"; write "one hundred fifty million." Do not write "waited a long time"; write "forty minutes." Do not write "very cheap"; write "one hundred fifty yuan, hesitated for three days."
The more precise the numbers, the more concrete the emotion. When it is precise to the point of not seeming made up, that is right.
Usage:
- Amount comparisons create a sense of absurdity (one hundred fifty yuan vs. one hundred fifty million)
- Time precision exposes inner state ("eleven seconds," "almost an hour")
- Counting exposes obsession ("nineteen years," "every time I change devices")
- Physical quantities create a sense of reality ("three point five micrograms," "two point five tons")
3. Objects carry the words left unsaid
Choose an object that runs through the entire text. It appears at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end. Each time it appears the context is different, the object stays the same, and the emotion layers up.
Good objects:
- Small enough, everyday enough (a blurry photo, a nail file, a roll of tape)
- In direct contact with the core relationship (something she used, taught, left behind)
- The last time it appears, the reader already knows what it means, but you don't say it
4. Repetition creates rhythm, breaking it creates an event
Find a short sentence or sentence pattern that can be repeated. Repeat it throughout the text to form a rhythm of "compliance." When this structure is broken for the first time, that is the turning point of the story.
Typical sentence patterns:
- "I said okay." (after repeating it a dozen or so times, one time not saying okay = the crack in the whole story)
- "I didn't ask." (after repeating it a few times, asking = the relationship has changed)
- "Nothing happened." (repeated until the last time = the biggest thing happened)
When breaking it, don't explain why it's broken. Just break it and move on.
5. Information gap structure
The reader always knows more than the narrator "says out loud."
Techniques:
- The narrator says "I believed everything she said," then immediately says "but I didn't believe a word of it"
- The details the narrator skips over lightly are exactly what the reader most wants to know
- Where the narrator "didn't ask," the reader knows why he didn't ask
- Certain information appears only indirectly through bills, an assistant's relaying, phone reminders
6. Scene transitions without transitions
Don't write "later," "so then," "next." Cut directly. Use a divider, or a sudden jump in time/place.
Like film editing: the previous paragraph is still in the Maldives, and the next paragraph begins directly with "On the eighth day Mom called." The reader will fill in what happened in between on their own.
Writing process
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Determine the core emotion: What do you want the reader to feel at the end of this piece? (Not big words like "sadness" or "happiness," but something more specific: for example, "a kind of loss that cannot be confirmed")
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Choose the object: Find an everyday object that can run through the entire text and carry this emotion.
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Determine the repetition structure: Find a short sentence that will repeat many times and finally be broken once.
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Build the numerical skeleton: List all the key numbers that will appear in the text. Each number should either create contrast or expose a state.
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Write the first draft: Write only actions and facts. After finishing each paragraph, check: Is there any explanation? Is there any commentary? Are there any emotional adjectives? If so, delete them.
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Do subtraction: After finishing the first draft, cut one third. The standard for cutting is: after deleting this sentence, can the reader still feel it? If yes, delete it.
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Check the information gap: What do readers know at each node that is more than what the narrator says? If readers know too little, add an indirect piece of information (a bill, a paraphrase, an object). If readers know too much too directly, delete the direct telling and change it to implication.
Banned list
Things that absolutely must not appear during the writing process:
- ❌ "I felt..." "I think..." "I realized..."
- ❌ "At that moment" "Suddenly" "For some unknown reason"
- ❌ Any sentence that tries to summarize the theme ("Perhaps life is...")
- ❌ More than one metaphor
- ❌ Any hint to the reader ("Can you imagine?" "Did you know?")
- ❌ Explaining a character's motivation ("She did this because...")
- ❌ Sentimental parallelism
- ❌ A beautifying filter when remembering (atmospheric sentences like "The sunlight was so nice back then")
How to write the ending
The ending must be a concrete image or action, not a summary.
A good ending:
- Returns to the object from the beginning, but the context has completely changed
- An everyday action, but the reader knows it will never be the same again
- The last sentence of the whole piece is the shortest one
Do not "draw a full stop." The story continues in the reader's mind.
Reference
Read references/techniques-from-source.md Learn the original source and examples for each technique.