Every morning, I set a session goal of 1,111. Not exactly sure why I picked that number, but that’s what I roll with. If I reach my goal, yay for me. If I don’t… well, not so much. On the days I don’t get to one-one-one-one, today for instance, I actually feel a bit bummed. I think being bummed is the reason I’m writing this post… because I shouldn’t be bummed.

First, my session is based off time, not words. Weekday mornings, I write for 1.5 hours before I have to get ready for work. On the weekends, I write until the kids get up. Second (and most important), if I step back from the word count aspect and look at what I did manage to accomplish today — removed about 500 shitty words from one scene, which ended up making the scene stronger and rewrote part of the current scene that helps move the story forward and actually sets up the next few scenes a bit nicely — I feel a little better.

Scrivener, my primary writing tool, has a daily word count feature that shows how I’m doing word-wise. I both love and hate it (the feature, not Scrivener). Here’s a screenshot of my past few days.

While my word count isn’t always something to brag about (I’m looking at you, -523!), there’s something here I’m proud of. See where it says Writing days: 13? That means exactly what it says: I’ve written words in this project for thirteen days. The reason I’m proud is because I started this story exactly thirteen days ago. That means I’ve put my ass in the chair every day since the beginning. In the end, that’s what matters. You’ll have some good days, some shitty days, some days where you’ll want to take your laptop to the roof and fling it like a goddamned Frisbee (I can’t be the only one who feels like that, right?) But no matter what, as long as you’re writing, you’re making progress.

In closing, I’d like to say that I will be adding this post’s word count to my daily word count, just because. That’s cool, right?