Growing as a Writer

What we can learn from the trees.

You probably know that the rings in a tree stump tell you the tree’s age was when it was cut down. But do you read those rings for stories of hardship and community?

Wide rings tell a tale of growth and abundance. Tightly packed, narrow rings betray years with little productive growth. Yet the tree kept growing.

The story of the trunk doesn’t belong to this tree alone. In forests, trees communicate with and support each other through underground networks of roots and fungus. They exchange nutrients and moisture.

Today’s solitary giant may owe its very existence to a boost from the network when it was a scrappy sapling, blocked from the sun by the high canopy. In its maturity, it fed nutrients back into the network, sharing its surplus rather than racing for the sky.

What can trees can teach us about writing, output, and growth?

Learning from the trees

As long as we write, we grow.

We polish skills and build our craft. In some phases, we may not publish much-or anything at all. Nonfiction writers can spend years researching or learning about their topics. And life often makes other demands on our time.