As February’s progress report was so late, I only have a couple of weeks to report on for March, so I’ll do us all a favour and keep it as brief as possible 😉
Last month I decided I would set myself a target of 500 words a day, to help try and improve my output. It only makes sense then to keep you up to date with my progress. Each month I’ll let you know the details of the total monthly target along with how many words I actually manage to hit. Hopefully that should provide a good barometer of how well I’ve succeeded/spectacularly failed during the course of the month. So, without further ado, here’s this month’s word report:
As you can see, two weeks worth of writing with a minimum of 500 a day should have given me 7000 words, but I managed slightly less than half of that. On the face of it that should be quite disappointing, but I still think I’ve been far more productive than I would have been without the word count – which is obviously the name of the game.
What have I learnt? Well, when you take the chance to sit down and focus on the writing, 500 words a day is more than achievable. For me, I found the commute to and from work was the most productive (mostly “to” as my brain tends to be fried after a day in work). I would begin each day with a blank page and just carry on from where I left off. Most of my work was done on my iPhone, using Scrivener. Each document you create in the app has a handy word count, and this definitely acted as a motivation to reach that 500. What’s more, breaking the writing down into small chunks just seems to make the big targets more achievable.
So why didn’t I hit the 7000? I probably could have if I’d made the most of every opportunity… but sometimes life has a way of distracting you and keeping you busy. It’s all worth it though, when that distraction follows through in your hands before making amends with the cutest smile. Thanks Penny 🙂
Still, I managed to finish the chapter I was working on, which never would have happened without the daily targets, so it’s something I’m going to keep working on. Next month, I’ll include some more details on Scrivener and how I use it. For now, I’ll leave you with one of my favourite passages from this month’s work:
But what could she do? He was the strong one. Big and brave and strong. He was the Wolf Eater. She was just a weak, little girl, blind to all things. What could she do?
You could come for me, as I would come for you.
Radok’s voice. Calm as a spring evening, cool as a winter frost. He would come for her, sure as the Black Wind would come for them all one day. And Seven help the man who tried to stand in his way
Tony
4th April 2018
Leave a Reply