Writing Beats Journey
Turns a pile of raw notes into an article written one grounded beat at a time, with you choosing the path
- Repository
- mattpocock/skills
- Stars
- 309,658
- Licence
- MIT
- Files
- 2 files
What it does
When installed, the agent helps you turn a markdown file of raw notes or research into an article. Instead of drafting everything at once, it proposes a few possible opening moves, lets you pick one, writes only that section to your file, then offers the next options. It tracks which concepts the reader already understands so each step builds on what has been explained, like a choose-your-own-adventure story.
Great for
- Writers who have research notes but struggle to structure them into a readable piece
- Students or bloggers who want to write incrementally and stay in control of direction
- Anyone who wants to keep editing control over each section as it is written
Skip it if
- People who want a full article generated in one go, since the skill deliberately writes one beat at a time and asks for input
- Users who do not have a source markdown file yet, because the process starts from existing raw material
- Cases where the article file is sensitive, since the agent writes to a path you choose and reads it back from disk
Try asking
- “Use the writing-beats skill on my notes in research.md and help me build an article about remote work”
- “Let's start a beat-by-beat article from raw-material.md and save it to drafts/article.md”
- “Offer me three starting beats from my interview notes, then write the one I pick”
- “Continue the article from where we left off and offer the next beats”
Install in 3 steps
- 1
Download the skill
The ZIP contains the 2 original files, the MIT licence and an attribution note.
writing-beats.zip - 2
Add it to your agent
Claude Code (all projects)
mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && unzip writing-beats.zip -d ~/.claude/skills/Claude Code / Agent SDK (this project only)
mkdir -p .claude/skills && unzip writing-beats.zip -d .claude/skills/Claude apps (web/desktop): Settings → Capabilities → Skills → Upload skill, and choose the ZIP.
- 3
Ask for the task
No special command needed — the agent reads the skill's description and loads it when your request matches. Try one of the prompts above.
Get better results
- Settle up front what your audience already knows, so the agent does not over-explain or skip needed context
- Pick starting beats that unlock the paths you want, and check the preview of what each pick opens
- Edit beats directly in the file if you want changes; the agent re-reads the file before each write and will build on your edits
What's inside
- agents/openai.yaml
- SKILL.md
Redistributed unmodified from mattpocock/skills under the MIT licence. The assessment was drafted with AI from the skill's files on 2026-10-29. Skills can instruct your agent to run code — read SKILL.md and any scripts before installing.