4 Essentials You Won’t Learn in Writing Class

I am a big fan of writing classes. Despite some people’s doubts about MFA’s, I consider my time at Vermont College of Fine Arts well spent—and every class I’ve taken since has offered me something useful. But writing classes can’t teach everything, and there are certain essentials they universally miss.

Here are four things writing classes don’t cover—four things I believe can make the difference between a fulfilling and successful writing life and one that runs off course.

1. The importance of community.

The writing life can get lonely.

Michael Ventura’s famous quote, “Writing is something you do alone in a room,” is probably the truest statement ever made about our chosen craft. And besides the solitary nature of writing itself, there is the unfortunate reality that no one—and by “no one” I mean no one—understands what a writer is going through except another writer.

This is where community comes in. Your community can be a formal writing group or an informal circle of writer friends. They can be people you meet with face-to-face or just online. But whoever they are, they must be people with whom you communicate regularly—and they must be people who write and take writing seriously.

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Building a community is essential to your growth as a writer.Your community will share your triumphs, commiserate over stumbling blocks, give you advice, read and comment on your work, and bolster you when you are down. In bad times and good, your writing community will be the only people who “get it.”

Those hours alone in a room? They’re a hell of a lot easier when you can come out once in awhile to share a beer with someone who knows what it’s like.

2. How much exercise and eating right can pump up your writing.

Few things impact your writing more than your health. Energy, focus, and creativity all depend on having a body in good working condition.

I’m far from an expert on nutrition and exercise, but I know the two basic things you absolutely must do if you want your writing to be its best: eat right and move your body.

The link between exercise and brain functioning is well established. Even a moderate aerobic workout will increase the level of neurotransmitters in your brain and improve oxygen and nutrient delivery. Research has also found that regular aerobic exercise boosts the size of the hippocampus–the part of the brain involved in verbal memory and learning.

The same is true of good nutrition. People with high levels of essential vitamins and omega 3 and 6 fatty acids—the “healthy fats”—get higher scores on learning and memory tests, while those with high levels of transfats—the hydrogenated fats found in many fast foods and processed food—do poorer.

If that isn’t enough to convince you, just think how much more energetic and focused you are when you are feeling in top shape. You don’t have to become a “health nut” who never has a margarita or a cupcake, but being reasonably healthy can be one of the best things you do for your writing.

3. The necessity of getting enough sleep.

“Make time to write by getting up fifteen minutes early.” This is a common bit of advice for busy writers—and it’s terrible. Cutting back on sleep is probably the last thing you should do if you want to write well.

You probably don’t need a university study to know that you have more focus and better memory when you’re rested—all you need is a night or two of poor sleep to figure that out—but  there is plenty of research out there to support it. Study after study has shown that people learn better and are more creative when they’ve slept well.

Sleep gives our brains time to organize information, weeding out the useless and “filing” what we may need later. Moreover, we actually solve problems in our sleep. If you get stuck on a plot point or can’t figure out where to take your story, sleeping on it can actually help you figure out a solution.

For work that doesn’t involve heavy lifting or operating a jack hammer, writing can be surprisingly exhausting. Getting enough sleep can give you the energy you need to keep going through the long hall.

4. The importance of a sense of humor.

Consider the following:

 Every year, there are a handful of horribly written bestsellers that make their authors famous and rich (there are also beautifully written bestsellers, but I’m talking about the really awful ones here.) Meanwhile, I know dozens of writers whose luminous novels and collections of wry, witty short stories are languishing on bookstore shelves—or aren’t published at all

The average book published with a large traditional publisher sells 5,000 copies. Assuming a price of around $15.00 and a standard contract of 10% royalties, that means you can expect to make about $7,500 for the book you spent four years writing—and that’s only if you actually get your work published by a large house.

Your book has less than 1% chance of being stocked in a bookstore—because it’s competing with the over one million books published every year. 

And guess what? It’s all getting worse!

So what can you do? You have several choices:

a) Sink into a deep and caustic bitterness.

b) Give up and go into advertising.

c) Go the F. Scott Fitzgerald route and stay drunk most of the time.

d) Keep a sense of humor.

My advice: go with d.

The ironies and inequities of the writing life are painful and pervasive. They can send you reeling or make you give up before you’ve started. Perhaps you can deal with them through sheer grit, but you’re a lot better off if you can learn to laugh.

See it all as a merry-go-round—perhaps a slightly evil, horror-movie merry-go-round, but one that has its share of dark humor. Learn to laugh at the insults and disappointments. Then, when success comes knocking, it will it will feel ten times as good.

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