Well, I'm not hitting my daily goals, but I'm still going along one day at a time, trying to get some writing in. Sometime, I need to start carving out a piece of time every day that I dedicate to writing. Not that kids won't interrupt or anything, but I need to have some time where I don't let myself get distracted with other stuff.
I've written about half the number of words that my goal dictates I should have written at this point of the month. So, should I look at the glass as half-empty or half-full? I'll try the half-full approach. After all, I'm writing. The creative juices are flowing. I actually have some scenes down on paper that I didn't have before.
As you can see by my sidebar, I'm a little bit obsessed with tracking my wordcount. :-D I've always tracked it in an Excel spreadsheet, but now I've moved on to putting it right up on my blog. I don't know if anyone actually comes and looks at it, (other than Ali, of course, because I tell her to) ;o) but I do feel more accountable knowing it's there.
I've realized something about myself in the past few days. I've thought of it before, but it really hit home recently. Unlike many other authors, I HATE the first draft and I LOVE the revisions. That's why I've revised my picture books, etc. 50 times each. And it's also why I get fed up with writing new stuff, and instead keep going back and revising the first half of the book that I've already written. I'm a perfectionist. It's true. You wouldn't know it from looking at the state of my house, though. ;o)
So, it's even more critical for me than it is for most people to just put my blinders on, tell my internal editor to shut up, and write like crazy to get to the end of the first draft. I can always revise it later. I can even re-write it completely using the same process, and then revise THAT. But what I can't do is revise if I don't have something already written.
I have almost half of the month left. I'm going to really pour it on from this point on. To make up for the fact that I didn't meet my goal for the first half of the month, I'm going to up the ante for the second half in order to meet my original goal to write 27,000 words in July. So now, I have to write 1612 words every day. That's my new goal, and I'm sticking to it. For reals.
I'll report back soon. :o)
I am SO with you on the first draft vs. revision. I mean, writing the first draft has its charms, but sometimes the only motivation I have to write something new is the fact that I'll get to reread it and revise it. I should check my word count - I don't even know how many I've written!
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