Being a Prolific Writer

 

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The word ‘prolific‘ is one I’d love to be labelled with… Oh look, she’s turned out another bestseller book! What a prolific writer she is…

I’ve aimed at ridiculous wordcounts per day, I’ve pantsed and plotted and settled into a happy combination of both. I’ve changed my sleeping habits, tried NaNoWriMo, read a ton of blogs from writers I love and respect and so on and so on.

The sad, dismal truth fact I’m currently facing, is that if you give me an hour in a day, or a few uninterrupted hours in a day, my output will probably be about the same.

Are you kidding me?

Sadly no kidding here. Maybe that will change, I live in hope.

In the meantime, I’m borrowing a lesson from my middle child’s induction ceremony into High School from the beginning of this year. They start the event with a single torch burning on stage. All the new Grade 8’s lead in in the dark. As you can see from the gallery above, the prefects start by lighting their candles and passing on the flame. The transition from a deeply dark hall to one lit by many individual lights was moving to say the least. The message was clear – your individual contribution counts.

How does that make me a more prolific writer? It doesn’t. But what it does do, is make me value each word that willingly joins the ranks of the little army of words that make up my story. I only need 65 000 of them to show up at the the right time, and I’m done. (Young adult, in case you’re wondering at the low count.) Do I cringe at 500 word days? Nope. Do I cringe at the 23 words I manage to string together before I’m called to go see Barbie perform a death-defying dive from the top of the tap into my 6yo’s bubble bath – AGAIN? Not any more.

All that matters is that I’m adding words. I will not waste energy on beating myself up for not being prolific. Maybe, just maybe… prolificacy (yes, I did just make that up) will creep up on me as I quietly grow my wordcount. Till then, I’ll soldier on, adding each precious word as it shows up.

If you have found any magic formula for upping your daily count, I’d love to hear about it. It probably won’t work on me, but go ahead and share anyway!