Participate in National Novel Writing Month. The idea is to write a 50,000 word work of fiction in 30 days, without fretting over quality too much. If you do this, you will learn a lot. It’s unavoidable.
I’ve done Nanowrimo on several occasions, beaten the goal twice. One can learn a lot that way, but for the most part I’ve only learnt “if I have to churn out 1,700 words a day, I write crap”.
I suspect the major benefit of finishing NaNoWriMo is realizing that writing a novel is actually possible, for you. That it’s not some impossibly huge and daunting project that you could never really pull off—you can do it in a month, even.
I’ve done Nanowrimo on several occasions, beaten the goal twice. One can learn a lot that way, but for the most part I’ve only learnt “if I have to churn out 1,700 words a day, I write crap”.
I suspect the major benefit of finishing NaNoWriMo is realizing that writing a novel is actually possible, for you. That it’s not some impossibly huge and daunting project that you could never really pull off—you can do it in a month, even.