Nobody writes a viral article or an award-winning script or a novel worthy of the Pulitzer on their first try. Like any craft worth pursuit, writing takes practice.
Beginning as a writer can be daunting because, typically, you start off by writing garbage. Incoherence plagues your paragraphs and ideas float between sentences without touching down concretely. This is how all writers commence their writing careers — poorly and haphazardly.
But writing garbage is nothing to be ashamed of, because it’s a process inextricable from becoming a better writer and learning the craft.
The writers who “make it” — not just the famous ones, but the financially secure ones — aren’t always the most talented. Talent isn’t inconsequential in any discipline, but it can often be overvalued rather than overshadowed next to work ethic. The most successful writers aren’t always the most talented, or the most clever, or the best storytellers. Often enough, the writers who make it are the writers who never stopped writing.
These writers pushed through the painful process of being a beginner, and eventually they were no longer rookies. They progressed to amateurs with faulty prose and budding vocabularies.
The writers who start as writers and continue to be writers are the ones who practice diligence and consistency.
Talent is one thing. Certainly it’s possible to be a talented wordsmith, or more verbally articulate by accident or by luck. But tapping into innate gifts remains a steep task — that’s where the diligence and consistency come into play. Diligence should take priority over talent for writers because it is far more reliable. Diligence takes care of you when your talent or spark of genius fails to show up.
Talent can come and go without practice. Diligence is what sharpens skills and instills discipline and routine.
Diligence pairs hand in hand with consistency. A diligent writer is a consistent writer, one who writes regularly and unfailingly, in spite of activities and obstacles and excuses.
Diligence helps writers push through resistance; consistency helps writers practice their diligence continually. The pairing of diligence and consistency lends itself to a simple arithmetic: volume precedes quality, not vice-versa.
You become a good writer through writing a lot. Volume skyrockets for writers who write diligently and consistently. The quality of writing improves over time and with more and more practice.
Remember: quantity first, then quality.
High quantities and large stretches of time spent writing remain necessary for writers to gain traction, confidence, and style. These are pillars of quality writing that cannot be attained without diligence and consistency.
Diligent and consistent writing preempts quality writing. This is unavoidable. For those hoping to bask in your natural dexterity with vocabulary and language, you should find a different pursuit.
Talent only gets you so far. Without diligence and consistency, wordsmiths can lose their linguistic touch and may be destined to watch less talented writers get ahead with their work ethic. All the literary talent in the world could go to waste if it isn’t placed under the stress and pressure of discipline — or, diligence and consistency.
The best writers in the world aren’t always the most talented. The best writers in the world are the ones who started writing and never looked back. They never stopped, or tried to coast on talent.
Diligence and consistency took the reigns for the very best of writers. Words were written no matter what — not because of the talent they already had, but because it was done as a matter of course, as part of ritual and discipline.
Of course, it’s easy to read books or articles in admiration of the writers. Those writers undoubtedly have talent. But that’s not the only thing they have. Talent may actually be their least impressive virtue.
The writers you and I admire are the ones who wrote diligently and consistently — they wrote with discipline and, in turn, their discipline took care of them by refining their talents.
Loved the text man. So much truth. ” they wrote with discipline and, in turn, their discipline took care of them by refining their talents.” Loved that phrase.