Writing Every Day: 1 Year On

Writing every day: is it necessary? Is it useful? Some people swear by it: ‘writers must write every day, in order to succeed’. Others disdain it: ‘what a load of codswallop’. (And isn’t that just a great word?) Some people roll their eyes and tell you it’s all just another useless debate about how to become the next JK Rowling or Stephen King… something that’s fairly unlikely to happen, for most of us. (Why waste our time trying to be the next whoever, when we can be the first us?) 

Where do I sit? 

Well, to start with, I have one firm writerly belief: all writing is good writing. Even bad writing is good writing. 

Please, allow me to elaborate. I believe that whatever we write serves a purpose: even terrible stories, phrases, sentences—hey, whole novels!—teach us something. Even if we’re not aware of it consciously. And, of course, once the words or the idea exists, we can always refine it into something better.

“When writing a first draft, I have to remind myself constantly that I’m only shoveling sand into a box so later I can build castles.” 

— Shannon Hale

I think that once we accept that even our not-so-great writing efforts have inherent value, it becomes easier to write more often. Nothing will slow us down as much (or stop us altogether, as quickly) as a fear of imperfection. Embracing our flaws and our foibles makes it far easier to implement habits: be they writing or otherwise!

And I do believe habits simplify the path to achieving our goals. Why? Because, to some extent, habit removes the pressure for ‘inspiration’ and ‘motivation’. Once we do something regularly enough, it becomes so routine that it begins to reduce the amount of effort it takes to perform the task.

Writing Every Day Though?

365 days ago, I decided to start writing every day. Why? That, I don’t really remember (a good moment to note how helpful it is to journal as a writer!). If I had to hazard a guess, it was likely tied to feeling that my writing wasn’t progressing. That if I cared about it, I needed to prioritise it more.

I began on the 17th of May. Before that, I’d written on the 12th of May, and the 9th… before that, it was the 18th of April. It was hard to make myself write, and it was easy for me to put it aside for other tasks.

Writing every day provided a way for me to inculcate that writing habit. I’m someone who tends to function better (and achieve more) with strong habits; they allow me to almost autopilot things that I might otherwise struggle to get done. 

Of course, various challenges arise. When I started, I wrote daily for 30 minutes; travel often cut that down to ten. Since returning home, other demands on my time and energy mean that 10-15 minutes has been the standard. Again, I have to remind myself that something is always better than nothing.

And I get results that way. Some outcomes are intangible. If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you might remember my pithy little post, 10 Things that 100 Days of Writing Taught Me. (It’s worth checking it out). Enthusiasm, a sense of accomplishment–these things are hard to tally up.

Other results are more easily seen. What, then, has writing every day given me?

1. 154 000+ new words (of varying quality)
2. 9,000+ hours of honing my craft & producing work
3. 300+ handwritten pages
4. 32 stories/idea fragments/character explorations
5. 15 fully-drafted short stories
6. 6 rough draft novels or novel openings between 10-60,000+ words. (Including: a portal to hell in a kid’s backyard; a pixie & a librarian setting out to save the world; a fairytale-esque escape for a traumatised woman; & a darkness & flame fantasy epic)
7. 2.5 moleskine notebooks filled.

And after writing that list, I feel ridiculously happy with my productivity in the past 12 months! 

What’s the Verdict: Writing Every Day, or Nah?

What seems to often get lost in talking about writing is how absolutely crucial it is to do what works for you. Whatever that might be. That’s the whole point of writing, really: no one else in the world will write as you do, can contribute what you can contribute. How you do that is your choice.

For me, writing every day, as I think the above shows, leads to productivity and (I hope) growth. I would never have gotten all of those various projects started (and abandoned, where necessary) without writing daily. Had I waited for inspiration, those words would have not only been a lot less, but likely very different.

So, do you need to write every day? Of course not. Could it be worth giving a shot?

Well, isn’t everything?

–A.