In your opinion, how long a person needs to write to become good at it? xxx
I don’t think that’s how it works.
Actually, I don’t think that’s how…anything works. I mean, yes, in developing any talent it is important to give yourself time to build the necessary skills. If you want to be a good golfer and only go to the driving range for a week, you have no right to complain that you aren’t Phil Mickelson. But even if you go to the driving range and hit balls for three years, you’re still not going to be a good golfer. Time alone does not build proficiency.
Because here’s the thing—practice can’t be aimless. What time allows you to do is build your knowledge of your own game. The longer you spend with any discipline, the more it shows where your weaknesses are. And knowing where your weaknesses are means you can better target your practice. Writing a lot, for a long period of time, means that you can realize, “huh, my dialogue is really stilted, I should work on that” and push yourself to listen to real people and how they speak. It means that you can figure out what a good rhythm is, where to place sentences, how long to make paragraphs. There’s time enough to read other authors, good authors, and refine your ear. There’s time to learn, and be better.
Because it turns out, as you figure out how to write, the definition of “good” changes. It grows with your writing. It’s why it’s so awful to go back to old pieces, because what was amazing to you six months ago isn’t any longer. And that process never ends—every time you pull up a blank word document, you’re back at the beginning, you have to start again, turn nothing into something good.
I’ve been writing for twelve years and I’m still waiting for it to get any easier.
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