I once took a screenwriting class in college.

And I was terrible at it. 

Even worse, I was surrounded by some of the most talented young writers in the country. So by contrast, I was especially bad. At that time, I didn’t want to learn - it was just a class I was forced to take to get my degree.

Fast forward to today. I’m a few years into screenwriting as a viable career path.

And much of that has to do with an unofficial apprenticeship my wife and I underwent when we were just starting.

Three years ago, Tara and I had an idea for a movie we wanted to write. We had never written anything before, so we just started pitching the idea around Hollywood. And we found a movie producer who wanted to help us write it.

But not just any producer - someone who had crushed the box office year after year, wracking up over half a billion dollars in receipts. And she was going to teach us how to write a movie.

Even more importantly - I was ready to learn.

In the first year, we went from bad to decent. In the second, from decent to good - with the occasional moment of greatness sprinkled in. And even though it’s a lifelong pursuit to improve my craft, those two years may just be the most valuable two years of my life.

Because I learned what it takes to get our (not just any) script into shape and ready for the market… from someone who has made millions doing it.

No amount of Googling could ever get me access to that kind of information.

And that’s what makes it specific knowledge.

Google is good. Apprenticeships are better.

Anyone can Google stuff.

Not everyone can ask specific questions about their project to a partner who has shared upside in the outcome.

That’s the power of apprenticeships - the better the apprentice, the more upside for the one sharing their specific knowledge.

This happened more recently with a comedy sketch Tara and I were filming. We had someone in our life who was fantastic at social media videos (among other things) and has been doing it for a long time.

While they didn’t directly share the upside with us, this person was still generous enough to give us specific feedback we could use to improve. And this was knowledge they had learned after years of trial and error.

And that’s when I realized that yes, specific knowledge is about taking action and getting feedback through experience… but it’s also about people!

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To get specific knowledge, find people doing what you want to do.

This is why networking is critical.

You won’t learn what you need to learn from the internet (although it can take you far).

You will learn it from:

1) tinkering and experimenting in areas you’re curious about, and

2) generous people who are doing it and are willing to share what they’ve learned.

It’s about being part of a community.

That’s been one of the most exciting benefits I’ve found from taking sketch comedy writing classes at the local comedy theater.

Learning the craft is awesome, but so is meeting the people who get as excited about this as I do.

These are the potential partners, collaborators, and friends who can teach you the stuff worth learning.

Being a writer can be a lonely road. But it took going back to school to realize that the most important benefits aren’t in class.

They’re in the people you meet along the way.

Thanks for reading.

-Thomas

P.S. You’re a rock star. Go get it.