Learning to write publishable material is essentially a social process. It’s like learning to say, ‘Oh not so bad, not so bad,’ when someone asks you how you are, rather than actually telling them anything.
“Hermit hoar, in solemn cell,
Wearing out life’s evening gray;
Smite thy bosom, sage, and tell,
Where is bliss, and which the way?
Thus I spake; and speaking sigh’d;
Scarce repress’d the starting tear;—
When the smiling sage reply’d—
Come, my lad, and drink some beer.”
Samuel Johnson | “Lines on Thomas Warton’s Poems”