Meta tags:

Headings (most frequently used words):

-

Text of the page (most frequently used words):
and (32), the (29), that (28), practice (26), you (23), hours (23), study (20), skill (13), talent (12), can (11), time (11), was (10), people (9), write (8), have (8), gained (8), your (7), with (7), but (7), about (6), who (6), all (6), way (6), what (6), for (6), let (6), level (6), over (6), 100 (6), not (5), are (5), just (5), art (5), drawing (5), one (5), better (5), very (5), things (5), involves (5), want (4), out (4), which (4), often (4), always (4), spend (4), those (4), they (4), well (4), right (4), good (4), lot (4), get (4), doing (4), look (4), hones (4), anything (3), this (3), does (3), characters (3), plot (3), will (3), did (3), math (3), best (3), learn (3), bad (3), great (3), long (3), like (3), formula (3), most (3), try (3), when (3), she (3), never (3), result (3), remember (3), other (3), three (3), talk (2), something (2), probably (2), from (2), form (2), emily (2), martha (2), sorensen (2), wonderful (2), loving (2), off (2), after (2), where (2), don (2), simple (2), see (2), how (2), pretty (2), story (2), would (2), another (2), goal (2), update (2), schedule (2), become (2), two (2), working (2), took (2), really (2), improvement (2), much (2), faster (2), everything (2), wasn (2), take (2), higher (2), say (2), same (2), thing (2), lots (2), almost (2), habits (2), eventually (2), longer (2), beginners (2), control (2), more (2), didn (2), now (2), improve (2), there (2), variable (2), multiplier (2), useful (2), compare (2), different (2), than (2), average (2), person (2), 000 (2), hour (2), sure, fill, reply, fairly, soonish, enjoyed, done, thrilled, hear, love, hearing, involve, buying, marketing, services, husband, seven, kids, handful, madcap, eccentric, swarm, head, devout, christian, prioritizes, god, neighbor, fantasy, science, fiction, full, whimsy, clever, charge, straight, through, spinning, wildly, rails, brats, magic, systems, strict, rules, surprising, limitations, twists, make, jaw, drop, romance, happily, ever, relationship, darkness, exists, only, help, grow, towards, greater, light, wait, uncooperative, protagonists, put, ran, cackling, maniacally, hope, leave, grinning, starts, author, horrors, use, worry, besides, fun, once, relevant, meaningful, going, makes, perfect, know, saying, 2002, decided, start, webcomic, called, loved, still, lifes, terrible, without, reference, particularly, goals, tell, enjoy, keep, five, days, week, until, finished, artist, succeeded, first, seriousness, course, comic, strip, thought, happen, happened, speed, molasses, winter, hurt, everyone, else, spending, seemed, improving, ten, times, practicing, crazy, gives, got, figure, each, listening, watching, processes, asking, honest, critical, evaluations, constantly, questioning, whether, effective, pondering, careful, self, evaluation, stepping, outside, comfort, zone, new, understand, yet, experiments, failures, friend, studies, deal, rarely, practices, draws, beautiful, however, draw, twice, turns, differently, every, predict, end, exact, opposite, again, absolute, basics, musicians, playing, singing, scales, around, nuances, work, deeply, ingrained, instinct, conscious, choices, reason, why, experts, teaching, even, need, efficiency, management, consistency, hone, reliable, eight, years, kept, dependable, character, designs, were, easy, recognize, plug, some, numbers, either, term, hmm, doesn, seem, real, progress, speak, sheesh, seems, little, bit, hey, efficient, divide, between, equal, amounts, consider, unfortunately, resist, temptation, hypothetical, talents, these, equally, hard, results, their, fair, life, realized, came, had, multipliers, holding, back, studying, enough, could, fix, far, less, couldn, mean, gave, figured, heck, means, expect, serious, disappointing, frustrating, frustration, isn, nothing, 001, accomplish, smarter, intelligence, wiser, wisdom, 800, 200, magical, roommate, post, august, 2026, official, website,

Text of the page (random words):
emily martha sorensen the official website post on august 3 2026 oh horrors i m about to use math don t worry it s simple math besides math is fun once you see how it s relevant and meaningful to you i m going to talk about study and practice practice makes perfect we all know that saying so the best way to learn is to practice all the time right well no in 2002 i decided to start a webcomic called a magical roommate i loved art and i was pretty good at still lifes but i was terrible at drawing anything without a reference i was particularly bad at people one of my goals was to tell a great story that a lot of people would enjoy another goal was to keep up the five days a week update schedule until the story finished another goal was to become a better artist i succeeded in the first two in all seriousness i did get better at drawing in the course of working on my comic strip but it took a really really long time i thought improvement would happen just by drawing a lot and it did but it happened at the speed of molasses in winter it hurt that everyone else who was spending as much time drawing as i was seemed to be improving ten times faster i was doing everything right wasn t i i was practicing like crazy what gives well i ve got a formula for you a very simple formula and one it took me a very long time to figure out study practice talent skill let s take each of those things one at a time study involves listening to what people at a higher skill level say watching the processes of what people at a higher skill level do asking for honest critical evaluations and constantly questioning whether you are doing things in the most effective way it involves pondering and careful self evaluation it involves stepping outside of your comfort zone to try new things you don t understand well yet it involves experiments most of which will be failures i have a friend who studies art a great deal and rarely practices it when she draws something it s beautiful however she can never draw the same thing twice it turns out differently every time and she can never predict what it will look like at the end that is the result of lots of study and almost no practice practice is the exact opposite of study it involves doing the same thing over and over and over and over again very often the absolute basics for musicians it s playing or singing scales over time habits form around the nuances that work best for you eventually those habits become so deeply ingrained that they re instinct no longer conscious choices this is the reason why experts are often not very good at teaching beginners they can t even remember what the beginners need practice hones efficiency practice hones time management practice hones consistency practice hones control practice does not hone improvement do you want to be more reliable practice do you want to get better study for eight years i kept a dependable update schedule with character designs that were easy to recognize and remember i didn t get faster at drawing and i didn t get much better at art that is the result of lots of practice and almost no study now let s look at that formula and plug in some numbers let s say you have 4 hours to spend on either study or practice what s the best way long term to spend that time let s try all study 4 hours of study 0 hours of practice 0 hours of skill gained hmm that doesn t seem very good no real progress to speak of let s try all practice 0 hours of study 4 hours of practice 0 hours of skill gained sheesh that seems just as bad how about a little bit of one and a lot of the other 1 hour of study 3 hours of practice 3 hours of skill gained 3 hours of study 1 hour of practice 3 hours of skill gained hey that s pretty good but look we can do better 2 hours of study 2 hours of practice 4 hours of skill gained do you see if you want to improve the most efficient way to spend your time is to divide it between equal amounts of study and practice now there s one more variable to consider and that s talent talent is a multiplier just like study and practice unfortunately it s a variable you have no control over it s often useful to compare your study or practice with other people s you can learn a lot of great things that way it s never useful to compare your talent with other people s you can t learn anything that way so resist the temptation to do it let s look at three hypothetical people with different talents 100 hours of study 100 hours of practice 1 talent level 1 000 hours of skill gained 100 hours of study 100 hours of practice 0 8 talent level 800 hours of skill gained 100 hours of study 100 hours of practice 1 2 talent level 1 200 hours of skill gained all three of these people are doing everything right and working equally hard and there are three different results for their skill level is that right is that fair probably not but that s life i eventually realized that when it came to art i had two multipliers holding me back i wasn t studying enough which i could fix i have far less talent than an average person which i couldn t does that mean i gave up when i figured that out heck no it just means that i have to expect it to take me longer to improve than your average person who is as serious about art as i am that s disappointing and it s frustrating but remember frustration isn t always bad talent is a multiplier not a result you can have a talent of 1 000 and do nothing with it you can have a talent of 0 001 and accomplish wonderful things you can t always be smarter intelligence is a talent but you can always be wiser wisdom is a skill about the author hi i m emily martha sorensen i have a wonderful husband seven kids who are often a handful a madcap eccentric swarm of characters in my head and i m a devout christian who always prioritizes loving god and loving my neighbor i write fantasy and science fiction that is full of whimsy i write clever characters who charge straight through my plot and spend it spinning wildly off the rails those brats i write magic systems with strict rules and surprising limitations i write plot twists that will make your jaw drop i write romance after the happily ever after that s where the relationship starts i write darkness that exists only to help characters grow towards greater light i write wait where did those uncooperative protagonists put the plot this time they just ran off with it cackling maniacally well i hope they ll leave you grinning can i write to you sure if you want to talk to me about something which does not involve buying your marketing services fill out this form and i ll probably reply fairly soonish if you ve enjoyed anything i ve done i ll be thrilled to hear from you i love hearing from people _