Goals and challenges…

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I have struggled to write the first six months of this year. And I honestly doubt anyone who has followed my posts lately fails to understand why.

But writing is important to me.

No… not just writing.

Storytelling is important to me. I would write my stories, regardless of whether I published them or not, but I’m grateful beyond words that enough people seem to enjoy my stories for me to make this my career. That is both humbling and heartening.

So, how do ‘goals and challenges’ fit into this?

Well, I may have mentioned that I was switching gears from The Fall of Skullkeep to the next Primogenitor story, which will be titled Tempus. And because I have struggled with writing earlier this year and want to kickstart myself making a habit of it, I have decided that I will finish Tempus by the end of July.

I will not accept anything other than a completed story by July 31st. To achieve this, I will need to write a minimum of 7,210 words each day. Here’s a screenshot of today’s records in my writing log:

I realize the text in the image above is a little small, so I’ll reproduce the relevant information here.

7,862 words across a total of 4 hours and thirty-nine minutes’ writing time, and 7,710 went toward Tempus. I averaged 1,690.75 words per hour.

I am very happy with today’s progress, and I’ll be especially proud if I succeed at my goal/challenge.

Last September, I wrote the last 24 chapters of Consular Times, totalling 65,640 words. I am already 13,968 words into Tempus, which means I have 12 days to write the remaining 82,282 words… assuming I write the full 96,250 words I aim for with my Primogenitor stories.

So far, I’ve finished the Primogenitor stories well short of my aim.

But that’s okay.

I don’t write to a set word count. I write to what feels like a complete and satisfying story. I will admit that I felt a little rushed on Consular Times, but I had a pre-order deadline staring me in the face (big mistake, and never doing that again) after already having canceled the pre-order for The Fall of Skullkeep.

I do not have any kind of external deadline overhead now, which feels great. It’ll be okay if it takes me a couple extra days to be sure Tempus is exactly the story I want it to be, but I want to push myself. I want to see if writing 7,210 words each day then lets me “slack off” in August and write only 5,500 words per day, which is my ideal average daily word count.

At least in my mind…

That’s entirely subject to change as I learn and grow as a full-time professional storyteller, though, not to mention get older.

But anywho…

I have a couple projects coming up in the very near future. A small side table (and I do mean small) and some shelving for my office, which I may have mentioned before. They might provide a nice break from the writing, as long as I can maintain my pace… or they may wait until August.

We’ll see.

I hope the days are treating you and yours well. Be safe out there.