Stages of competence

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In a post a few weeks ago I mentioned unconscious incompetence, which is from the Stages of Competence model I studied in a long-ago psych class. I love how this model can be applied to writing. The four stages are:

1. Unconscious incompetence
2. Conscious incompetence
3. Conscious competence
4. Unconscious competence

This chart describes each stage and shows how you move from one level to the next as you gain more skill at whatever it is you're doing--or trying to do. (Start in the upper left box and follow the arrows.)

Here's an example of the stages using my own writing journey.

Unconscious Incompetence
I wrote my first novel thinking I was the next JK Rowling, that the concept was completely unique, and in a few short months I'd see my book in print. Writing a novel wasn't all that tough. You just had to get words on the page. Whee!

Conscious Incompetence
I'm not sure when or why I realized my writing was awful--maybe after I was well into my second novel and reread my first manuscript. What a horrible, sinking feeling! I sucked! I think this is where a lot of writers quit, or if they're still motivated to write, do something about getting more competent. I joined SCBWI, found a crit group, read more middle grade and YA novels, attended conferences, and studied books on writing. On a bad writing day I'm still here.

Conscious Competence
I believe I reached this stage as I was writing my fourth novel, and it's where I find myself more often now--writing with some skill, but having to think about what I'm doing.

Unconscious Competence
The analogy I like for this stage is driving a car with a stick shift. At some point, you don't think about clutching and shifting and pressing the gas pedal; you're just driving. With writing, you're just ... writing. The feeling is similar to the first stage, only now you know what you're doing. (The danger of this stage is that you can become complacent and not put enough energy into your craft.)

One reason I like this model is because it's not about talent, which I have no control over. It's about working at something until I get it right, which I can control. Or as Ursula K. LeGuin said about writing:

You sit down and you do it, and you do it, and you do it, until you have learned to do it.