Being able to write fiction does not mean you have the ability to teach others how to do it.

If someone tells you that they tried for years and year to do something, and finally when they realized X, they were successful, does that mean that X is the secret to success? Probably not. It means that *lack* of X guarantees failure, but if you’re missing A, B, C, D, or E, all of which are necessary, and all of which the other writer had all along, having X still won’t help you a lot.

But if successful writers are terrible at telling you how to succeed, they can tell you a lot of war stories. War stories don’t lead to your success, but they humanize the writer who is telling the story. If you walk away from the class thinking, “Well, if he can succeed, I *surely* can,” and that’s not a small thing.

And sometimes, there’s something very much more important. I used to beat myself up over not spending 8 hours a day in front of the keyboard. Another writer told me that he makes it a point to *avoid* the keyboard until the story is written. Once it’s done, *then* he sits down and puts it on paper, and the whole thing flows out of him in a matter of a few days, even if it’s taken a year or more to gestate between his ears.

Following his advice, I found that to “force it” before it’s ready often leads to stillbirth. Similarly, instead of trying to get others to read the first part before the whole thing is written down, I try to *avoid* letting others read it, until everything is hammered into place.

But the courses were expensive, and I don’t think they were legitimate business expenses; I was being a groupie, not a writer.