Writers don’t talk about practicing in the way some other artists do. Musicians practice. Dancers practice. Singers practice. Actors practice. But I can’t remember hearing a writer say, “I’m going to practice writing dialogue today,” or “I can’t go to the game tonight because I need to practice my writing.”
Yet practicing your craft in the same way musicians or dancers practice can be both deeply satisfying and enormously beneficial to your writing.
What does it mean to practice writing?
For one thing, it means getting away from the idea that what you’re writing has to be perfect —or at least publishable. For a musician, a practice session is not the same as a performance. Performance is about perfection. Practice is about making mistakes, trying new techniques, seeing what works and what doesn’t. You can practice writing by letting go of the idea that you have to be writing for submission, or that if you don’t end up with a publishable work, you’ve failed. You haven’t failed. You’ve practiced.
Practicing also means setting aside worries about how others are going to respond to what you’re writing. When a musician practices, she isn’t concerned about what her audience is thinking because her audience isn’t there. A writer’s audience shouldn’t be there either, but too often, there they are, looking over our shoulders, invisible but oh-so-real. Imagine how a musician might freeze up if he kept envisioning a recital hall crowded with people all watching and listening as he learned a new piece. Practicing removes that audience—for the musician and the author.
Practicing means aiming for improvement. A musician may thoroughly enjoy practicing, but enjoyment isn’t the main reason she’s doing it. Musicians practice with a specific intention: to get better. Just because we’ve removed the audience from our brains doesn’t mean we’re just writing for ourselves. That’s journaling, not practicing. Practicing means writing with a target, an aim. That aim is better writing.
Practicing means focusing. If you’ve ever watched a serious musician (or performer of any sort) as he practices, you’ll see the essence of concentration. Learning to fix your mental gaze on the page and screen out everything else is essential for practice. The ability to turn our full attention to our writing—without the distractions of deadlines, an imaginary editor, or the illusion of perfection—is what makes practice valuable.
Practicing means taking risks—without the fear of failing. “The good practicer tastes the vitality of adventure and the dramatic rewards of risk-taking,” writes William Westney in The Perfect Wrong Note, a book for musicians. It is in practice that we can try all sorts of things, no matter how outrageous or unusual. It is through hours of practice that we can determine which of our experiments has worked and which hasn’t.
We writers can learn a great deal from musicians and other performing artists. One of those valuable lessons is how to take time away from trying to get our novel written, our next story started, our work published, and simply practice our writing.
Thank you for this reminder.
argh. That post says zilch.
I’ve been struggling lately. I have the longing to write, but for some reason I haven’t been able to make myself sit and write. Oh, heck, who am I kidding. It’s just fear.
Of everything. Rawr.
ugh.
So your post reminded me that if I think of it as practicing–well, that’s not so scary.
That’s pretty much everything that was in my head when I said that simple thank you. lol
Hi Stacy. You sound like you’re in a place I’ve been many, many times–a place virtually every writer finds herself sometimes. It can be so frustrating. It sometimes even leads a talented writer with a promising future to give up! What I do when I’m there is give myself permission to write anything. I’ll just describe my desk or my hand, or I’ll write about what I’m going to have for dinner or how frustrated I feel or anything. I don’t care if the writing is awful or even makes sense. I just WRITE. Slowly, slowly–but very surely–that brings me out of it. I’m not saying this will work for you. We’re all different. But that’s what works for me.