If you pay attention to the speakers and instructors at a conference, set and reach an attainable goal, use your sweet networking skills to make some fantastic connections, then you can't help but leave the experience flying sky high. I'm talking zinging around in the clouds with a fistful of helium balloons like in the movie UP.

The trick is to harness all that high-octane energy so that you can actually sit in a chair and write.

Newsflash: learning about how to write is NOT the same thing as writing.

Attending conventions is great, but the work of a writer is to go forth and, umm, you know where I'm going with this, don't you? WRITE! Use that info. Work that knowledge. Thinking, dreaming, talking are all elements of a writer's life, but unless you actually slap down words onto a blank screen, guess what. You're not writing.

Conventions aren't cheap. The only way you'll recoup that money is if you put what you learned into practice. So...just do it.