Word Practice - An Odyssey

Ten thousand hours of practice is required to achieve the level of mastery associated with being a world-class expert-in anything. In study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals, and what have you, this number comes up again and again. Ten thousand hours is equivalent to roughly three hours a day, or twenty hours a week, of practice over ten years. - from the book This Is Your Brain On Music, The Science of a Human Obsession by Daniel J. Levitin



How do you practice writing?  Do you set aside time each day to let words gallop across the page or computer screen?  Must you trick the words and bridle them with "discipline"?  Or, do you let the wild ponies rear and run?

When the writing odyssey begins it races into mysteries and undiscovered realms. If let loose, thoughts and ideas gambol into unknown territory and meet a variety of experiences and creatures along the way.

A writing schedule nurtures the ability to put one word after another. Words teeter, then bounce and balance and whisk you away. When creative instincts take over, a passion for words pushes past tedious times. Thoughts chased might allude but writing practice shuttles them beyond expectations.

At times when the words take over it might not seem like the way you want to go. Stop thinking. Let practice permit experimentation, wildness and humor to enter.

It may take ten years to write about a subject you have searched and pondered.  Sift and sort and disregard its calling.  One day it will jump onto the page and perform its best.

Take your time.  Let the moments unfold and flow into each odyssey of words.


Creative Write:  What subject or idea have you chased and attempted to write about for several years?  Try a freewrite today and see if it becomes more friendly.