The best way to improve your writing is to share it online

Once upon a time, a woman wanted to get better at writing, so she decided to take a class.

The class was structured as a workshop. Each week, someone brought in a piece. Everyone read it, and then they gave comments on how to improve it.

The woman took many such workshop classes. Sometimes the workshop loved her work, other times the workshop hated it. After each workshop, she’d try to revise the piece, but she’d also internalize the lessons of the workshop and attempt next with her next story to write something that might please them.

At the same time, she was submitting her stories and essays to editors. Almost always they were rejected. Sometimes they didn’t get rejected, sometimes they got accepted, and even published, but then there was a second-order rejection, because after publication it felt like nobody really read them, and she didn’t get any of the awards or anthology reprints that indicate your work is really hitting and making a splash.

Tired of this process, the woman began to put her work online.