Tag: Daily goal

Time to get comfortable

Lynn

Last night, I sat down and played with some numbers. I really wanted to see what it would take to get myself to a point where I am earning a really comfortable living from writing my fiction, using somewhat conservative numbers but not so conservative that it is depressing.

The outcome wasn’t unexpected.

But as usual, even though the numbers are hopeful and seem realistically possible, they are the same numbers I keep coming back to—and that I have yet to be able to reach and sustain for more than a few days in a row.

To make a living, I need to write about 1,300 words a day if sales stay about the same for the number of words written based on historical earnings for 2022–2023. To live very comfortably, I need to write about 3,600 words a day. Both these numbers are rounded up to the nearest 100 words.

I’ve tried in the past to reach and sustain a 3,600 words a day streak and failed at it even though it only requires about 600 words an hour for 6 hours a day. I can write 600 words an hour, and it’s not a terrible stretch for me. But the 6 hours a day, or even the routine of maintaining daily writing, is where I hit a wall.

All that said, I am here today, writing this, because I want to give it another go. I really want to live more comfortably than I do now and anything averaged out long term between 1,300 and 3,600 words a day has the potential to get me there.

Today’s overarching goal: write 3,600 words.

Today’s specific goals:

  • Finish a short story
  • Finish a chapter in a serialized WIP
  • Finish about half of another short story

Fear and growth and perfection

Lynn

This post is a few days old, but there’s value here I think so I’ve decided to post it even though I wasn’t going to originally.

First thing I did after I woke up this morning was open OneNote and type a note to myself (this was after recognizing that I just didn’t have what it took to hit 3,600 words every day).

I think I’m going to settle on a daily goal of 2400 words. As much as I’d like to write 3600 words every day I’m just not sure that kind of pressure is going to work.

Then I looked at my calendar to adjust my goals and saw what 3,600 words looks like every day as a time commitment. I re-opened OneNote.

After looking again at my calendar, it’s obvious that I’m just getting scared. But even if I have a bad day if I do all six sessions I’m almost guaranteed to keep a 2000-2400 words a day average which is something I’ve wanted for a very long time.

I can do this.

And I can. I can do this.

The fact is, it’s not just fear. It’s also perfectionism. I don’t have to throw away my goal for 3,600 words just because I might not reach it every day. And if I don’t reach it every day, well, failing at something is better than not trying at all. :D

It’s the only way to stretch and grow.

So, yeah, still trying. 2020 is the year of the 3,600 words a day goal. :D

Since I wrote that, I’ve made some changes to my goals and have decided not to micro plan my writing time so strictly but the one thing I haven’t done is back away from the big numbers. I intend to grow this year, and I intend to learn, and I do not intend to let the fear of failure keep me from trying to stretch myself.

Whatever your goals, you shouldn’t let it stop you either.

:-)

Today’s goal (day 11)

Lynn

Oh, dear. I was all set to post my goal today and realized I was suffering from goal creep again. I was going to post a crazy high goal and had a rationalization for it all written out. I deleted it.

Time to reset.

I face a constant push and pull situation with goals. Too small and I don’t do enough, too big and I do more but get overwhelmed.

Today’s goal: blank.

:D Yes, BLANK.

I’m just not in the mood to set a goal.

I do, however, have a hard minimum I want to hit today.

And for the foreseeable future.

On the other hand, I’m already tired of having a daily goal to deal with. Changing the nomenclature doesn’t help. Target, aim, blah blah blah. It’s all the same and I know it and I can’t hide that fact from myself.

Don’t get me wrong, I still want to get to 3,200 a day and that number is stuck in my head, in a good way, I think. I won’t go into all the calculations that led me to that number, because I’ve done some of that in prior posts. Suffice to say, I used highly conservative numbers so I had the absolutely best chance of far exceeding my financial goals if I can ever reach a consistent 3,200 words a day.

BUT, I also calculated a fairly loose minimum word count that I need if things go well, and it’s 962 words a day, which gave me the idea to set a hard minimum of 1,000 words a day. If I can’t reach that and maintain it, I really do need to go find a different job. That’s just reality. It’s no different than setting a hard minimum to actually, you know, go to work every day. Money’s got to come from somewhere!

The hard minimum of 1,000 words a day is my go to work every day number of words. And dear God, it’s embarrassing in the extreme to say this, but if I can’t manage the 1-3 hours a day of writing that this requires, I’m not in the right career. If it’s that hard to make myself write, I need to move on and be done with it, and putter with writing only when I want to.

Wow. I guess I’m in a mood. ;) Maybe I should channel this into today’s writing.

The good news is that yesterday I did write more than 1,000 words of fiction, so I’m already off to a good start even though I didn’t know then that I was going to do this. :-)

Tomorrow, I don’t think I’ll be doing another goal post. However, I think I will do a simple summary post. See you then.

What I ended up with: 430 words.

What did I tell you about me and goals? Apparently a hard limit is pretty much the same thing. Ugh.

Today’s goal: 3,200 words (day 10)

Lynn

Today’s goal: 3,200 words.

The hourly goals are killing me. Just can’t seem to crack them. The harder I push, the more I rebel. Therefore, it’s back to the flat word count goal for this post.

I would have said “for today,” but the fact is, I’ve already been writing today and I actually started the day with a five hour goal (again) but immediately ran into issues with that plan. I couldn’t stick the first 50 minutes (I was trying for six 50 minute sessions). So I recorded 9, 16, 25. Then did 10 on my next 50 minute session and realized I just wasn’t going to be able to do the long sessions today. But, my pace is good today, and the writing is going well, so I’m just going to focus on the words.

What I ended up with: 1,414 words, on one story.

Today’s goal: 5 hours of timed writing (day 9)

Lynn

I enjoy the challenge of working on multiple stories so I’m going to spread those hours out over the seven stories I have in progress. They’re all growing at a satisfactory clip and I’m pretty doggone happy with how it’s going.

The biggest complaint I have is that I really need to read some of my older books in the series and I’m not making a lot of progress with that. I got halfway through another yesterday, and that was awesome. I can’t believe how awesome and fun it was to read. :D Ego, ego, I know, but I write these stories to please myself first, so if I’ve done that in a way that gives me many rereads of pleasure, I can’t help but feel like I’ve actually accomplished something awesome! :D

I tried yesterday to spend more time on one story so I could get closer to finishing something this week, but that really didn’t pan out in the end. Today I’m going back to letting my muse direct me.

The one thing I will say is that I’m confident I can finish all my books. I’m not of the type to work on lots of things and never finish any of them, and I would never recommend working on multiple stories at a time to a writer who hasn’t nailed the ability to finish a book yet.

You gotta learn how to finish and that should be the first thing you focus on learning. It’s that important.

Let me say it again: Don’t try working on lots of different books at one time if you aren’t confident in your ability to finish! You’ll flit from one project to another and use them all to keep you from having to do the hard work of getting to the end on any one of them.

What I ended up with: 488 words, 20 minutes.

Well, it was my best 20 minute session ever. That’s gotta count for something.

Today’s goal: 7 hours of timed writing (day 8)

Lynn

I totally failed at 5.5 hours yesterday, so why not set today’s goal for 7 hours?

Yep. I know.

But I have a plan. So I have to keep this short.

Today’s goal is 7 hours of writing. I’m not setting a word count goal because I’m pretty sure as long as things go okay, I’ll totally make the 3,200 daily goal I keep trying for right now.

The plan is work on whatever I want to keep the writing flowing, so no goals broken down by story today.

See ya!

What I actually ended up with: 1,434 words and 1.78 hours.

Yes, more words, fewer hours. It’s like a curse. Set a goal and move backwards toward it. ;) Since my daily word count was larger than my average and yesterday’s word count, I’m going to call it one of those sort of wins. :D

Today’s goal: 5.5 hours of timed writing (day 7)

Lynn

One week in on my effort to post daily goals and I’m not disliking it. :) As long as I keep it to the point I think this is the kind of accountability post best suited to me, of all the kinds I’ve tried over the years.

Today’s goal is a little different. I’ve set a time goal in addition to my usual 3,200 words, but I’m not putting the 3,200 words goal into words. (Even though it is here, it’s not, so don’t get any ideas. :D)

I’m doing this because I want to start practicing writing more and just setting the word count goal isn’t getting me past my biggest obstacle to writing more: the number of hours of writing I manage to focus on each day.

The only thing I can think of to fix that is practice.

So, same set up, different goals.

Today’s goal: 5.5 hours of timed writing.

3 stories = ½ hour each
4 stories = 1 hour each

Or, to compare to prior day goals:

½ hour (192 words) x 1
½ hour (296 words) x 1
½ hour (301 words) x 1
1 hour (603 words) x the other 4

Swapping out stories might be just the thing that makes this attempt different from the last time I tried setting hour goals. There’s a bit of challenge and excitement in the chase to get to all the stories in one day that I really like.

Plus, as the numbers above show, this won’t interfere at all with my 3,200 words goal, because 5.5 hours is just about the right number of hours most days to get me to 3,200 words. :)

3,200 / 5.5 = about 582 words

That won’t interfere with my 3200 a day goal at all, because that actually fits right in the time range I need to get those words. 5.5 hours. I can’t think about that though because it messes with my head. So I’m just going to think about the 1 hr (and .5 hour) of writing I want to get for each of my stories.

Anyway, if I find I don’t like it, I can always go right back to chasing the word count goals (which I’ll probably be doing anyway even with the hour goals, but the truth is, this is just me trying to find a way to practice focusing for longer periods and actually getting in all the time I need so I can reach those word count goals!

What I actually ended up with: 1,109 words and 1.92 hours.

It was better than my current September daily average of 692 so it was a sort of win. It helped push my September average up above 700. :)

Today’s goal: 3,200 words (day 6)

Lynn

Day 5 is missing. I know. :) I’m just not even going to bother going back and correcting it. Day 5 I wrote 130 words.

Today’s goal is identical to the day 4 goal, even though I’d like to write more. I just don’t see how that’s even going to happen. The evening of day 4 (Saturday night) I realized I’m going to have to go back and read all my books again. Some of the details are getting fuzzy and it’s time for me to refresh my brain. I’m struggling too much with my current stories because I can’t remember things I need to remember. That’s 28 books I need to reread.

I’ve read a few recently. 28 is the number I still need to reread. 18 or so of those are novels and the rest are shorter than that, thank God. :D

So, today, the goal is 3,200 words, broken down by story. :)

192 words x 1
296 words x 1
301 words x 1
603 words x the other 4

What I actually ended up with: 2,355 words.

192 words x 1 (done)
296 words x 1 (done)
301 words x 1 (done)
603 words x the other 4 (got 1 done, didn’t touch the other 3)

Today’s goal: 3,200 words (day 4)

Lynn

I have afternoon plans today so I’m going to try to get my words done early today. I had planned to start at 9 AM but the power went out early and a few other things happened and my plans didn’t pan out. :)

I’m a little shocked that it’s already 11:02 am to be honest.

I have 8 stories on the go right now and I’ve been working on each of them this last week. My goal is based around that fact.

Today’s goal: 3,200 words, broken down by story. :)

192 words x 1
296 words x 1
301 words x 1
603 words x the other 4

Rounding makes it 3,201, but I don’t have to round. The silly numbers total up to exactly 3,200 based on how many months I want between the series releases. It’s both ridiculous and amazing that the number worked out so perfectly, but I took it as a sign. :D

3,200 is the perfect number.

Someday my abilities will catch up with that fact. :D

What I actually ended up with: 1,073 words.

192 words x 1 (done)
296 words x 1 (done)
301 words x 1 (done)
603 words x the other 4 (barely got started)

Today’s goal: 3,200 words (day 3)

Lynn

A late start today, due to a morning obligation. I have several hours of time I’d like to spend writing, so I’m going to use the timers and see what I can get done.

I’m sticking with the 3,200 word goal today because despite everything, it should be possible, especially if I can get on a roll and keep my words per hour up where it’s been the last few days.

What I actually ended up with: 643 words.

I suspected that getting a delayed start was going to hurt me. :-o

Ah well. 643 is better than my 638 daily average for 2019, so it’s still a win in a certain light. :)

Today’s goal: 3,600 words (day 2)

Lynn

Most of my daily goals are probably going to be 3,200 words for a while, because that’s the number of words I’ve decided I can write each day by the math, and, therefore, should be writing each day. :) As usual, I don’t know how long this frame of mind will last, but I’m hopeful it will last a long time.

3,200 / 5 = 640 wph

Now, as usual, my struggle actually lies with getting the stupid hours I spend writing up. That’s always where I struggle. I can’t stay on one task for too long before I get antsy and have to get up and move around and the moment I do that… three hours gone!

I’ve been writing in 20 minute blocks because writing in anything longer makes it too hard to get started right now, and anything shorter means I spent way too much time on breaks. (It’s like the timer is a break trigger. I find it nearly impossible to ignore and simply restart it for another session. I have to take that break.)

All that said, today’s goal is actually 3,600 words, for reasons too convoluted to get into. :D

Anyway, I’ve dragged this out and I meant to just post a quick goal, so there. :)

What I actually ended up with: 569, working on one story.

Today’s goal: 3,200 words (day 1)

Lynn

I’m thinking about starting a series of daily posts where I post my goal for the day in the morning (ish) and then try to meet it.

I have a tendency to set big goals that are hard for me to meet, but I’m thinking that’s a feature, not a flaw, of my process, because I also tend to stop the moment I reach a goal and lose all my interest in doing more. I can tell myself a hundred times that the goal is a minimum, but it doesn’t matter when I get there, I see it as goal accomplished and disengage.

This is my test run of this so we’ll see how I feel about it at the end of the day (and tomorrow, when I have to remember to do it again). :D

Today’s goal: 3,200 words.

What I actually ended up with: 2,088.

That’s a decent word count for me!