Are you motivated by challenges or deadlines?
Generally, deadlines freak me out but a time challenge always gets me motivated. I like to test myself and see what’s possible.
It occurred to me on Monday as I was posting the motivational quote for the week that July was almost over and there are only five months left in the year.
That’s Enough Time To Write a Book
I then started crunching the numbers and realized that if I wrote 500 words every day for the rest of the year, I’d have a novel. There’s essentially 150 days left in the year and 500 words a day multiplied by 150 days is 75,000 words. That’s a good number for both print and eBooks, particularly romances.
And if you start writing today, rather than August 1st, there are about 160 days left in the year which puts you at around 80,000 words.
Imagine how awesome it would be to ring in the New Year with a completed manuscript!
Why Such a Low Word Count?
I’m a firm believer in setting goals that you know you can accomplish Writing every day is the primary goal here. It’s the habit that’s being established. 500 words is an extremely reasonable number of words. That equates to about two double spaced pages.
You can write two pages a day, right?
Of course you can. So do it. Start today and celebrate the end of 2013 with a completed manuscript.
Here’s My Approach, if It Helps….
I am going to school full-time and I own a writing business. I’m also in the process of publishing my third fiction novel -Cheating Time (you can read the first chapter HERE and you’ll notice I’m a little behind my publishing deadline. Did I mention I don’t like deadlines…)
I also have two teenagers and a husband that deserves my attention, so that doesn’t leave much time in the day. For the rest of July I am working on my plot, characters, and outline for a new novel. Each day, I’m spending no less than 30 minutes on book planning.
Come August 1, the book writing process should be in full swing and I plan on writing every morning before my kiddos get up. I will write those two pages, 500 words, as I drink my morning coffee and contemplate the day. (I’ll probably spend a few minutes reading what I wrote the day before to help me progress more quickly).
That’s it. I’m giving myself an hour each day to get it done. That should be more than enough time, particularly if I go to bed each night thinking about the story.
So… here’s the deal. I’ll post my weekly word counts and talk about any struggles I faced during the week and how I resolved them. If you feel like it, you do the same. I’m thinking I’ll post this info on Wednesdays. Maybe together we can get a book done by the end of the year and help each other through the tough times.
Happy Writing!