Show, Not Tell

The secret sauce to impactful writing

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Remember how much you loved show-and-tell as a kid?

You’d walk to the front of the classroom, clutching some cherished treasure, then present it proudly to your peers. It’s human nature to want to see something, not just hear about it. We are wired for wonder, created to behold, prone to gaze. This simple grade school tradition taps into this God-given appetite for spectacle, and as writers, we should too.

Today I’ll teach you how to captivate readers by showing them a truth—not just telling them about it. If there’s one writing principle to master, this is it.

From Abstract to Concrete

To show readers something (and not just tell them), it all comes down to using concrete language.

Why does this matter?

As Dan and Chip Heath point out in Made to Stick, the more tangible something is, the more we remember it and care about it.

For example, it’s easy to forget an abstract maxim like: “Be careful when eating messy foods.”

But tell a hilarious story about spilling spaghetti all over your white shirt or dress on a first date, and readers will repeat it back to you.

Big Idea: Compelling writing is concrete (not abstract).

Here’s where a lot of writers go wrong. Unintentionally, they violate readers’ longing to behold by reducing things to propositions and definitions. They engage the mind but neglect the heart.

In other words, they spend too much time telling and too little time showing.

The Art of Showing

So how do we make our writing more concrete?

To answer this question, let’s learn from a master lyricist, Ben Gibbard, the lead singer of Death Cab for Cutie. Their song, “What Sarah Said,” is a masterclass—for songwriters and authors alike—on how to use concrete language to bring something abstract to life.

Here’s the verses:

And it came to me then
That every plan
Is a tiny prayer to father time

As I stared at my shoes
In the ICU
That reeked of piss and 409

And I rationed my breaths
As I said to myself
That I'd already taken too much today

As each descending peak
On the LCD
Took you a little farther away from me

Amongst the vending machines
And year old magazines
In a place where we only say goodbye

It stung like a violent wind
That our memories depend
On a faulty camera in our minds

And I knew that you were a truth
I would rather lose
Than to have never lain beside at all

And I looked around
At all the eyes on the ground
As the TV entertained itself

Drawing inspiration from these lyrics, here’s four ways to make your writing more concrete:

1. Use all your senses

An easy way to show readers something is to use your five senses to describe it. What does this truth look, feel, smell, taste, and sound like?

In the song, Gibbard tells us about the unsettling aroma of the ICU—a concoction of urine and harsh cleaning chemicals. This sterile, uncomfortable detail immediately transports us into the severity of this scene.

Gibbard also describes what he sees.

First, he’s looking down at his shoes. In fact, everyone is staring at the ground, while the TV “entertains itself.” In the gravitas of “a place where we only say goodbye”, the baubles of daytime television fall flat.

Stay sensitive to your senses. Pour them onto the page.

2. Use similes and metaphors

Showing readers something doesn’t always require a full-blown narrative. Sometimes all you need is a phrase or sentence to make something abstract more concrete.

Similes and metaphors are an effective way to do this. (For those with PTSD from high school English, stick with me. This will be painless.)

Gibbard uses a simile and metaphor in the same verse to describe the painful process of losing memories:

It stung like a violent wind (simile)
That our memories depend,
On a faulty camera in our minds (metaphor)

By describing his internal pain as “a violent wind”, and fading memory as “a faulty camera”, Gibbard ushers us into his experience.

As you write, always consider what comparisons or images you can use to invite the reader into the story you’re telling or the point you’re making.

3. Use more nouns and verbs

This one’s simple: if you want to show readers something, use nouns and verbs.

Look at the plentiful nouns in Gibbard’s song: shoes, cleaning chemicals, the lines on a heart monitor, vending machines, tattered magazines, a violent wind, a camera, and a TV.

His writing also teems with verbs: stared, reeked, rationed, taken, took, stung, knew, looked, entertained.

Now contrast Gibbard’s visceral description with this bland retelling: “I sat in a hospital waiting room, bracing for the impending loss of someone I loved, surrounded by others in the same situation.”

When you remove the interesting nouns and vivid verbs, you’re left with something generic. Uninspiring. Stale.

Nouns and verbs make things more real. Lean heavily on them.

4. Teach through pictures, not just propositions.

Explanation is not the enemy—we should be clear in our writing, but clarity isn’t antithetical to creativity. Instead of beelining to a proposition, paint a picture with your prose.

The best writing says something without actually saying it.

If you’re skeptical, why did Jesus teach in parables? Perhaps because a story well-told, which forces listeners to ponder and ask questions, actually drives truth deeper than simply saying it straight.

There’s a balance here, between communicating between the lines and saying it plain, but in the western world, our communication too often devolves into propositional prose.

Gibbard’s lyrics show a better way.

Though he could have described sitting beside a dying loved one’s hospital bed, instead he laments how each “descending peak on the LCD took you a little farther away from me.” He leaves space for us to figure out what’s happening, in a way that piques curiosity without making us work too hard (if readers can’t figure out what we’re saying, we’re just frustrating them).

Gibbard sets us up for an aha moment, when suddenly we can visualize those oscillating lines on a heart monitor—each one a cold, mechanical reminder that we’re all powerless to push back the power of death.

We feel the sting because we can see it. He’s painted a picture. Think of your words as brush strokes on a canvas. Respect the reader enough to require reflection. They’re up to the task.

A Story Worth Showing

Friend, make your writing more concrete. Readers will remember, feel, and understand your message far more than if you leave things in the abstract.

There are four effective ways to show—not just tell:

1. Use all your senses

2. Use similes and metaphors

3. Use more nouns and verbs

4. Teach with pictures, not just propositions

I’m rooting for you.

Will

PS - I’m rolling out a course on “How to Build a Book Proposal.” Join the waitlist here.

Will is the founder of Writers Circle, a community to help writers sharpen their skills and publish their work for the glory of Jesus. He is a senior editor at Waterbrook and Multnomah—an imprint of Penguin Random House.