Beware the Dandelions!

Like dandelions, some words are pretty but fragile.  A puff of air and they disintegrate!

For example, take the word "simple."  Unless you can finish the sentence "simple in that...." in a few words that convince others of the simplicity, you've got yourself a dandelion.

Other dandelions:

Tractable

Rich

Sophisticated

Important

Bridge

Unite

Contribution

If you spot a dandelion in your writing, first try to give it meaning: tractable in that there are....; bridge in the sense that....; contribution because.....

If you succeed in giving it meaning, perhaps you no longer need the word itself.  Instead, you're showing people what you mean by it.

Post by Varanya Chaubey
Image by By Amirpix at en.wikipedia [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons