Many years ago I remember hearing the advice that there is no substitute for simply writing. The advice suggested that aspiring writers write a daily diary.

I didn’t intend to be a writer but I did end up doing a lot of writing. From the age of five I was in boarding school and we had to write a weekly letter. These started in Grade 1 with simply copying a sentence or two from the board. By Grade 4 we were writing our own letters.

From then, every week of my life that I was away from my parents I’ve written a letter. I never thought much about it until today but at the very least letter writing has taught me:-

• Discipline
• How to explain what I’ve done – reporting in short summaries
• Choosing interesting incidents to report
• Punctuation, spelling, grammar – from sheer repetition

At about age 16, I also started writing a diary. From age 20, that has been a daily habit. To the above benefits has also been the reporting of dialogue and writing about feelings.

I have been blessed to have grown up in the right time and circumstances to have had these disciplines as part of my life.

How could you gain writing practice?