I finished all of the books on my list but I’d rather not review them. I got some school work finished and I’ve got more to do, but I’d rather not list it. I did and am working on some interesting projects for Creekside, but I have no particular inclination to discuss them. Back home, I’ve been cooking sausage and peppers. There’s not much else to say about that.
Some weeks are less – inspiring – than others. This week was just as long as last week and the week before it and I can’t honestly pinpoint any particular event that made previous weeks motivation and this week unnecessary, but the truth is I could skip this week’s entry and consider myself fulfilled.
The general advice is to say nothing unless you’ve got something to say. When it comes to sitting next to me on a plane, that’s certainly very true. When it comes to a personal blog, largely unread, and certainly unnecessary, I’d rather prioritize routine and perseverance than veracity and meaning. I write each week because I need the practice.
The latest trend in pop science is the 10,000 hour rule. I’ve heard it in a few dozen contexts and I have no idea if it is genuinely supported by some particular science, a modern coach’s tale, or some misinterpreted maxim from something. Either way, the gist is that competency requires time, a lot of it. A musician who practices 10,000 hours will be talented, an athlete that plays 10,000 hours will be good.
It’s not necessary an especially insightful conclusion – obviously time is required and at the scale being discussed any particular number would be more than I’ve put in. The most that can be said is that talent, at least in the sort of activities that this would be relevant toward, specialization is necessary. The star football player/virtuoso piano player is largely unknown probably for many reasons but partially because there’s simply not enough time someone to accomplish both.
I’m not going to rant about how spread out I am – web design, network administration, writing, tennis, hiking etc. I’ve long since given up being anything but a career generalist but I wonder how something like writing would be approached given the 10,000 rule being true and relevant.
Certainly many people who have been highly successful at other endeavors have written books, some of acceptable quality or better. Writing, however, is not as distinct a skill as playing the piano or some game. At its core writing is simply putting language in a visual format, akin to speaking and adjoined to reading. Would speaking and reading be considered practice for writing? There is a necessary degree of truth there but to what extent? A person who speaks a lot and frequently certainly does not become a masterful writer and plenty of masterful writers are inept speakers. There is some point of decreasing gains where speaking at least, and probably reading cease to be that helpful.
And what of practice. I’m practicing right now but am I improving, or simply creating. I sense that writing becomes a matter of scattershot randomness. Given enough words some will inevitably come out clear, lucid, and moving, while most will be rather shabby.
That’s not strictly true either. Good writers write well nearly always. This blog is poor, other blogs are quite good. It’s not limited by content but by voice. In novel form the metric is probably creativity and the time spent editing – 10,000 hours choosing words and parsing paragraphs would be the better judge than 10,000 hours writing total. In the shorter mediums, I highly doubt that the best blog writers spent all that much more time writing their entries than I do. They’re simply more talented, maybe from practice, or from innate skill, or random chance. There is something beyond time alone that links with quality of writing, and I’d love to have some idea what that might be.
That, however, is a problem to be explored on some other day. I’ve met my particular quota for this entry, without saying anything at all, which means the goal is met and I can move on to other things (also writing but elsewhere). Unfortunately I don’t have any particular internet link for this week, so here’s a picture of a bush dog.
