Bad To Better

I’ve always thought I was a good writer.  Since I was a young boy, I felt I had a better grasp on the craft than the average person.  Unfortunately, what I’ve discovered over time is that the average person sucks at writing, so measuring against that kind of standard is a fool’s errand.  Moreover, my understanding of what constitutes “good” has evolved considerably in the last two decades.

It has been said that it takes approximately 10,000 hours to master a craft.  I’ve spent a good amount of time(although I don’t know if I’ve gotten to that number yet, I’m close), and it has helped me understand how much working on that craft, even through awful times you don’t recognize, is essential to shaping talent and skill.

I say “awful times you don’t recognize” because as decent as I think I am now, I also once thought I was good and now see how badly I sucked.  Going back to my first full length novel, On Freedom’s Wings, I cringe at how bad it was.  The idea – humanity trying to reassert itself in a galaxy it set on fire – had promise, but not only did I write it mostly as a Star Trek knock-off, the dialogue and action are bad.  I mean real bad.  Cringy bad.  I’m embarrassed by it now, even more so that I gave it to others to read and glowed in their praise.  Being removed from that work by more than 2 years, I now get just how nice they were being in trying to spare my feelings.  Probably a good thing my 25 year old self couldn’t give it to my 45 year old self, for my older self would’ve crushed my younger self.

Work.  Work, work, work.  Write a lot.  Give it to others and force them to give you honest feedback, both on how well or poorly it’s written, and on how to improve it(or if it can be improved; some writing simply needs to be destroyed so you can start over).  Without that, you will never get better, and while some you give your work to may be nice, that doesn’t mean they’ll pay for it.