Back at the beginning of the summer someone made a post on Facebook about the #100daysofwords Challenge.
The basic idea is that you write at least 100 words a day, for 100 days in a row. If you miss a day. you have to start over again. The intent is that you write 100 words (or more) of fiction, but the the guidelines are pretty loose. You can write anything – an essay, poetry, e-mail, blog posts, a letter to your favorite Aunt, whatever.
I started on June 10, working from writing prompts. I would write down my prompt, set a timer for 10 minutes, then write until it went off. I usually had between 250 – 400 words. Sometimes I went a little over the time limit if I had an interesting bit of writing going. Then I recorded my word count for the day and my total overall word count. I posted these on Facebook in my local writer’s guild group. Several other members of the guild, as well as a writing forum I’m on, were playing along too. It is nice to have some accountability partners to help keep you on track.
Today was Day 100 of the challenge, and I managed to stick with it for the whole time. My final word total was 26, 620 words. I got a few snippets that I think I can turn into short stories, or possibly even full length novels. I’ve got one snippet that I definitely can turn into a full-length novel. I had a celebratory brownie to mark the occasion.
The goal of the challenge is to get you into a daily writing habit. I’ve fallen out of that with teaching Python programming classes. But classes were out for the summer so I felt the need to get back into the writing swing of things. I’ve also been working on getting a novella put together. It is currently in the hands of beta readers and the initial comments have been favorable.
For any aspiring writers who say that they don’t have the time to write, this disproves your objection. I did over 26,000 words, ten minutes at a time. You could do 10 minutes a day, for 100 days in a row. You’ve got ten minutes a day you can devote to your writing, if it is important enough to you. In the morning before you go to work, during your lunch break, commuting to or from work (but not if you are driving, obviously, but if you are on a bus / train / carpool), a few minutes after dinner, or last thing you do before going to bed, make the time.
Now, I wonder how long I can keep this going without missing a day?