“If you want to write a novel, write a novel. If it’s essays you want or short stories, write them. In the process of writing them you will learn how. You can have the confidence that you will gradually acquire the technique and craft you need. Instead people often begin writing from a poverty mentality. They are empty and they run to teachers and classes to learn about writing. We learn writing by doing it. That simple. We don’t learn by going outside ourselves to authorities we think know about it.”
- Natalie Goldberg