250 Words A Day Challenge For Writers
(If you’d like to aim for more words, please visit the 500 Words A Day Challenge or 1000 Words A Day Challenge instead.)
The goal of the 250 Words A Day Challenge is simple: to inspire writers to write.
Too often, I find that writers start motivational challenges like NaNoWrimo with enthusiasm and good intentions, but give up when they start missing their daily targets for more than a few days in a row…undermining their confidence and defeating the purpose of the original challenge.
I also wanted a challenge that lasted the whole year rather than just a month.
Hence, the 250 Words A Day Challenge.
What are the rules?
Try to write 250 words a day, at least six days a week.
As long as you are sincerely and consistently TRYING to write 250 words a day, then you can post the badge on your blog or website. If life occasionally gets in the way, that’s ok — as long as you promise yourself to get back on the wagon as soon as you can. If you sometimes don’t reach 250 words, that’s also ok — but try again the next day.
The badge has to link back to the 250 Words A Day Challenge page (the page you’re reading right now).
Where can I get the badges?
You can choose from a selection of badges.
What’s to stop someone from posting the badge just for show?
Nothing. But since there are no prizes other than personal, the writer is only cheating herself.
Be honest with yourself. If many days pass without you giving full effort to meeting your daily wordcount goal, then take the badge off your site. If you’re going on a long vacation and you know you’re unlikely to be doing any writing, then you should take the badge off your site. For the Challenge to work for you, the badge has to mean something.
Do I have to report or post on my progress?
Not unless you want to. I do find that being held accountable somehow helps with motivation, though, so I encourage you to post about your progress on your own blogs, or on Inkygirl when I do my weekly Word Challenge Check-In.
What if I can only write 100 words a day instead of 250?
Feel free to suggest other wordcounts. If there is enough demand, I’ll make more badges.
What if I can consistently write -more- than 250 words a day?
Good for you! Then go for the 500 Words A Day Challenge or 1000 Words A Day Challenge!
What type of writing counts toward the challenge?
Again, this is up to you to decide. Some writers may just want to count words written for a first draft of a novel. Others may want to include how many words they’ve revised. Still others may count ANY words they’ve written, including blogs, Twitter, non-fiction, outlining, poetry and other writing. As Chris Brogan says, writing begets writing.
SOME TIPS:
If you don’t reach 250 words one day, don’t try to make up for it by writing extra words the next day (though feel free to write extra, of course!) — that increases your chance for repeated failure, which increases discouragement and the tendency to give up on your 250 words a day goal. DON’T GIVE UP.
SOME USEFUL TOOLS:
Simple word counters
Writertopia Wordcount Script: just paste in your text, hit SUBMIT and you’ll get back the number of words.
Enso Words: Enso is free and runs on Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Vista. Spellcheck, wordcount, other features.
General wordcount trackers
Curious Device: another little progress meter: straightforward word counter.
Writertopia progress meter: provides two graphical progress meters that can be embedded in your web page or blog.
Yahoo widget wordcount: written for NaNoWriMo, but looks like it could be used for a general wordcount.
Wordcount tools for Wordpress
ProgPress: A progress meter plugin for Wordpress by Jason Penney. This is the one I’m using (see right-hand navigation bar) because I can track multiple projects within one widget. Jason writes:
Thanks for mentioning ProgPress. If anyone tries it out and has any feedback/suggestions, I’m always glad to hear them. Good luck to everyone participating. I know you can do it!
Scribometer Progress meter by David Anaxagoras. David writes:
Hi Debbie! The 1,000 words a day challenge is a great idea. I’ve updated my Scribometer progress meter WordPress widget to track any unit the user wants to measure, so now it can be used for words as well as script pages or cups of coffee consumed.
Murray’s Wordcount Wordpress Plugin: wordcount for a post
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I wanted to start the 250-words-a-day challenge a month ago but did not. Now I see you’ve made a separate badge for it. That is just so sweet. I HAVE to do it now!
This is eaxactly what I need! I hope to work up to a 1000 Words a Day!
The correcte link is http://juliecornewelliswriting.blogspot.com/
This is awesome!! I had already begun my own private 250 words a day challenge, and this pairs with it beautifully. I’ll add the badge to my blogs.
Thanks for doing this.
Corra
from the desk of a writer
corra’s writing room
Thanks for this–I found you thru Corra’s Writing Room and since I want to develop the habit of writing daily, this is a great way to start–I’ve found 250 at a time is easy, but the daily habit is hard???? This badge sets up accountability for me.
Thanks for a great post!
What a great idea, thanks!
A handmade trackback since I can’t figure out how to do it the official way.
I mentioned this article at my blog in a january in review post. Cheers! – Corra McFeydon
I’m taking this challenge on! Since my blog is somewhat obsolete, I’ve posted the badge in my journal; it means more there anyway. Thanks for the manageable challenge to help me get my story back on track!
I’m gonna take this challenge on as I was just lamenting to my friends that I’ve lost my writing mojo.
I’m still participating in this project daily. But I’ve moved to Wordpress:
from the desk of a writer
corra’s writing room
All right, I’m in! I’ve probably been doing around 250 on most days since starting my new novel project, but if I could make it every day, that would be great.
(I don’t have a meaningful website at the moment to post the badge, but I’m working on it…)
… and here we are now:
http://satu.wordpress.com
With shiny added badge-ness.
Count me in as well. I’ve added a post on my blog about the challenge.
I guess the link would help.
http://literarylolita.wordpress.com/2010/03/03/aspiring-writers-pledge/
Saw this, started doing it on 14 Feb, have since done at least 250 words a day, except for one day when I had so many other things to do I forgot. My ‘rule’ for myself is to write 250 words of new fiction. So have I have a whole bunch of potential short story beginnings! I figure that at the end of March I’ll have about 40 of those, and will go back and look for any that I could add another 250 words or so to.
The 250 words works for me, it’s enough to get one idea going and and I can do it in less than 20 minutes so I can fit it in or even do it on my way to bed, so to speak.
Thanks for the idea. Don’t want a badge, but I’ll check in when prompted by Inkygirl on twitter. By the way, you – Inkygirl – are one of my best ‘follows,’ your tweets lead me to lots of useful and/or interesting blogs etc.