Someone messaged me recently asking about my workflow—how I research, how I write, and what tools I use behind the scenes.
I started typing a quick reply, but halfway through I realized there was something deeper here than just a list of steps, so I turned the answer into this post instead.
I also need to say this up front: I grew up in the time of the Dewey Decimal system, when you had to be in a library, walk the shelves, and physically pull books if you wanted to learn anything.
No internet, no search bar, no instant PDF.
You stood, you scanned, you flipped pages.
I've been a blogger-for-hire since 2016, long before generative tools started spitting out full drafts on command.
What that means is simple: I was trained the slow way—deep research first, then writing—and I carried that habit into this era, even when shortcuts became cheap and easy.
I've been trying to revive my ghostwriting career.
So far, in terms of actual paid work, close to nothing.
The inbox is quiet.
People read, people react, but in terms of getting hired, it's still close to zero.
When that message came in—"What's your workflow for research and writing, and what tools do you use?"—I thought I'd just send a short explanation.
Then I saw that to answer honestly, I had to talk about more than apps and steps.
I had to talk about why I write this way at all.
THE TOOLS I USE (AND THE ONE I CAN'T AFFORD ANYMORE)
I don't rely on one magic button.
I use multiple research and fact-checking tools: news databases, archives, open data, verification guides, and tools built to track misinfo patterns and source quality.
For a while, I paid for a monster tool that cost around 300 USD per month.
That tool gave me speed and reach: better search, richer data, smarter filters, easier cross-checking.
It also hurt my wallet every billing cycle.
When the income dipped and stayed low, I had to let it go.
It was expensive in a very real, very practical way.
I still won't say what it is.
I'm still a ghostwriter for hire, and in a market drowning in shortcut content, knowing how to use serious research tools is part of my edge.
WHAT THE EXPENSIVE TOOL REALLY DID
That 300 USD a month did not think for me and did not write for me.
It never handed me a ready-made angle.
What it did was amplify the work I was already doing.
It made tracking timelines easier—who said what, when, and how their story changed.
It let me cross-check claims across multiple outlets and databases without the usual rabbit hole of browser tabs.
It pulled up official documents, policy texts, and statements faster than I could on my own.
And it helped me see patterns in coverage and messaging that would have taken much longer to notice manually.
But even with that level of help, the core remained the same.
I still had to sit down, read long reports, watch hearings, listen to podcasts, and sit through boring but important videos.
I still had to take notes, decide which sources I trusted, and figure out what the pattern actually looked like.
I DO NOT USE MACHINES TO WRITE FOR ME
I do not let any machine write my pieces.
The thinking, the structure, the sentences—all of that starts with me.
What I do use are suggestion features.
I'll paste a paragraph and ask if it's too long, too vague, too repetitive, or confusing.
Sometimes I ask for help spotting where I'm saying the same thing twice in slightly different words.
The problem is, a lot of the suggestions sound plastic.
They come with that generic rhythm, the same safe adjectives, the same soft, overpolished transitions.
It feels like something assembled to sound smooth but hollow.
I reject most of those.
Because once your ear adjusts, you can hear when the voice turns from human to templated.
THE TRAILS I SEE IN OTHER PAGES
Once you stop letting machines write for you, you start seeing it everywhere.
The same structure, the same warm-but-generic tone, the same "helpful" phrases repeating in different posts across different pages.
Using a machine to write is like a crime scene.
It leaves traces: certain overused words, mirrored sentence structures, identical paragraph shapes, that too-smooth cadence that doesn't sound like anyone you actually know.
Some writers don't notice this yet.
They paste the output, click post, and move on.
The fingerprints are all over the text.
Once you know what to look for, it becomes obvious.
You can tell when a human draft was improved with a few suggestions versus when the machine drove the whole thing and the human just fixed typos.
HOW I USE SUGGESTIONS WITHOUT LOSING MY VOICE
My workflow is simple on paper, brutal in practice: I write first, ask later.
I start with my own draft—messy, repetitive, sometimes over-explained, but mine.
Only after that do I bring in the tool.
I'll ask: which parts repeat, which sentences drag, which sections feel thin.
Sometimes I ask for alternative phrasings just to see if I missed a simpler way to say something.
Once I see the suggestions, I don't swallow them whole.
I pick what helps clarity, then rewrite in my own rhythm.
I cut the obvious template phrases.
I refuse the tone that makes me sound like everyone else.
My rule of thumb is this: at least 98% of a piece has to be me.
My questions, my structure, my examples, my judgment, my phrasing.
The tool can point at weak spots, but it doesn't get to own the voice.
If at any point I read my draft and feel like the personality drained out of it, I roll back.
Better flawed and human than smooth and anonymous.
THE THESIS APPROACH BEHIND EVERY PIECE
Every article I write starts like a thesis.
Not in language, but in seriousness.
It usually starts with a small irritation: a quote that doesn't sit right, a statistic that feels off, a pattern repeating in headlines, a gap between what officials say and what documents show.
From there, I build questions: What exactly am I trying to understand?
What are the possible explanations?
What do I need to read or watch to test those explanations?
Then I go long.
My first drafts bulk up to around 5,000 to 7,000 words.
They contain multiple explanations for the same point, side histories, legal references, and context that may never see daylight.
That draft is for me alone.
It's where I argue with myself, where I entertain that I might be wrong, where I let things be messy before I think about readability.
CUTTING FROM THESIS TO BAREBONES
Once that oversized draft exists, the cutting starts.
I read through and ask whether a detail actually helps a regular reader understand something, or whether I'm just showing off the research.
I ask whether a paragraph is doing any real work, or whether it's just a comfort blanket I wrote for myself.
I ask whether someone with five minutes to spare will find that section worth their time.
I remove paragraphs I spent an hour writing.
I delete clever lines that don't serve the core point.
I simplify sentences, break them apart, and strip away anything that feels like padding.
Sometimes I'll ask a tool to highlight repetition or flag long sentences.
But the choice to cut or keep rests with me, not with whatever algorithm is trying to optimize readability.
What ends up on my blog or my Facebook page is the barebones.
You see the skeleton of a much bigger thing that lived and died inside my drafts.
FROM "JUST LEARNING" TO ACCIDENTAL POLITICAL BLOGGER
I started MCT for a simple reason: I didn't want to be fooled.
Fake news was everywhere, and I wanted to train myself to tell garbage from facts, spin from documentation, propaganda from evidence.
In the beginning, I wasn't trying to be a political blogger.
I was just someone who wanted to understand what was happening, and to stop sharing nonsense by accident.
I read fact-checks and watched how disinformation spread.
I followed fact-checking initiatives and projects that tried to track lies during elections and big political moments, just to see how they worked and what they looked for.
The goal was personal: learn enough so I could filter my own feed and help family and friends avoid obvious lies.
But the more I learned, the more I wrote.
Little posts turned into long breakdowns: timelines, patterns, contradictions.
Somewhere along the way, I became a political blogger—probably by accident.
It wasn't a branding decision.
It was what happened when I kept following the thread and refused to stop writing about what I was seeing.
WHY I DECIDED I NEEDED STANDARDS
Once I realized people were actually reading and relying on my posts, I knew I couldn't treat this like a hobby.
If I kept writing about politics without standards, I'd be no different from the pages I criticize.
In the Philippines, we've seen what happens when people throw standards away.
You get cult-like loyalty, online mobs, and cheerleading that ignores human rights, law, and basic decency.
"DDS" went from its violent roots ("Davao Death Squad") to "Duterte Diehard Supporters," worn like a badge.
I didn't want to wake up one day and realize I'd become a different version of that: loyal to my own bias, blind to my own errors, just as hard-headed, just as unfair.
So I told myself: if I'm going to keep doing this, I need standards.
Clear ones.
Ones I'm willing to be judged by.
WHAT THOSE STANDARDS LOOK LIKE FOR ME
There's a post I never published.
I had the angle, I had the receipts, and I was angry enough to write it fast—which should have been the first warning sign.
Halfway through, I realized I'd stripped so much context out of the story that the person I was going after looked worse than the facts actually supported.
The core criticism was fair.
The framing wasn't.
So I shelved it.
That's the standard in practice—not a checklist, but a moment where you catch yourself being unfair and you pull back even when you don't want to.
I've also cut lines I loved because they were cruel in a way that didn't serve the argument.
Funny, sharp, a little vicious—and completely unnecessary.
The line would have scored a point at someone's expense without adding anything real to the piece.
Those get deleted.
What I keep returning to is a question I picked up somewhere in my upbringing that I didn't fully understand until I started writing publicly: does this make things clearer, or does it just make me feel better?
If the honest answer is the second one, I fix it or I drop it.
QUESTIONING MY OWN UPBRINGING
To write this way, I've had to question my own upbringing.
What I was taught to respect.
Who I was told to obey.
Which leaders and institutions I grew up trusting without evidence.
I had to admit that some of the values I absorbed were incomplete or convenient.
Obedience without accountability.
Respect for authority without scrutiny.
"Don't get involved"—even when something clearly crossed a line.
If I didn't challenge those things, I'd fall into the same trap I see in diehard camps: loyalty first, truth second, if at all.
Not questioning yourself is how you slide into that kind of follower mindset.
So I keep interrogating my own biases.
Why am I angry at this person?
Why am I softer on that one?
Am I reacting to evidence, or to old loyalties and personal history?
It's uncomfortable, but I don't see another way.
You can't claim to fight disinformation outside while lying to yourself inside.
FACTS AND THE LINES I WON'T CROSS
If I protect anything in this process, it's facts.
Not as accessories, not as seasoning, but as the structure holding everything together.
I use facts to inform and to support arguments honestly.
That means checking where they came from, comparing multiple sources, watching for misquotes, and being careful when numbers are used to sell a story.
In a country where disinformation is a daily reality, treating facts loosely feels like betrayal.
It betrays readers who trust you, and it betrays any claim you make about caring for the people reading you.
Words can smear people, inflame situations, and pull attention away from real harm.
I've known that since the early days of writing about politics here, and I can't unknow it.
So I ask myself: Am I being fair?
Am I presenting this fact in context?
Am I hinting at more certainty than the evidence supports?
If the answer is uncomfortable, I fix it.
If that means losing a strong line, then so be it.
Most days, I just hope I'm doing it right—or at least close enough that I can keep correcting course as I learn.
WHY I WON'T NAME THE TOOL AND WHY I STILL WRITE THIS WAY
So yes, I use several tools.
One of them used to cost me 300 USD a month, and I had to stop paying for it when the math no longer worked.
I'm not going to name it here because as a ghostwriter, I still need an edge.
The market is packed with content that leans heavily on machines to do the thinking and writing.
If I hand over my strongest research weapon publicly, I erase part of the gap between me and people who don't care about process.
Work is still slow.
Inquiries are still close to zero most weeks.
There are days when this whole path feels like an old promise I'm stubbornly keeping.
But this is how I know I'm still myself: every piece starts with real questions, goes through heavy research, inflates into a draft nobody sees, then gets stripped down and rebuilt with care.
Tools help, but they don't lead.
What you see in my blog or in a Facebook post is the visible 2%.
The rest is reading, cross-checking, thinking, deleting, and protecting facts as if they were the only thing standing between us and full-on nonsense.