McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

Writing every day

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pathele:
all,
couple of quick questions: 
1) How much do you write each day on your current project? 
Someone told me recently that on days that I write less than a thousand words that I shouldn't have bothered.  I try to write everyday, but with two young children (3 yrs and 5 months) I don't always get to spend as much time as I would like.

2) do you consider work on your plotting (outline/notes/whatever) as part of your writing for the day?

To me, when you quantify your writing (ie, you must write 1500 words / day) then you stifle creativity by trying to force something that will, in all likelyhood, be edited out later anyway. 
thoughts?

-paul

terioncalling:
1) I write whenever I get inspiration or have the time.  Inspiration is usually scattered and I have the time now but that's about to be blown away by school.

2) Yes.  I have a whole...er, 30 something pages, I think, of just notes for my fantasy world.  Since its a big world with lots of things in it, I want to know the meager limits of what I can do within it.  Though the stories connected to it are really the only one's I've ever written outlines out for.  Eh.

fjeastman:

I've heard it's less about word-count per-day than it is about time per day.  Butt In Chair.  With two kids it can be hard, but the suggestion is to find at least X minutes/hours/etc per day that you write, every day.  Even if you spend your BIC time staring at a monitor in abject horror at your writer's block, you do it, every day.

That's the hearsay, I'll let you know if it works.

--fje

Abstruse:
I go where my muse takes me.  Unfortunately, my muse has been a quiet little bitch recently and I've been stuck forcing myself to write.  Basically, I just do it whenever the mood strikes me and work on whatever project I'm in the mood for.  Which means I have about 300 megs of half-finished crap on my computer ^_^;;

The Abstruse One
Darryl Mott Jr.

Kiriath:
I've written 500 words a day for ... several years. This semester, I'm planning to leap it ahead and do 1000 a day. Every frelling day. Even during college. 2000 or more seems to be professional level, so I have to hurry up. :)

Background material counts on occasion. Usually, it's all on the novel. If I edit the story, oh well; I have to get the bloody thing written.

It usually means I write five days of the week, for whatever reason, and brood elsewhen.

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