In setting my writing goals, I've come to a bit of a conundrum. I've read, and heard, writer's profess that they aim to hit a certain word count daily. But what counts towards a word count? If my goal is 3000 words a day, after this post am I down to 2900? What about an email, text messaging or twitter? Which words, in your opinion, count towards your daily words count? Please click on the poll to the right and let me know your opinion.
Forever grateful,
Nina
I guess it depends on your goal. If you're trying to write a novel, those are the words that count. But if you're just trying to stretch and write more, everything counts!
ReplyDeleteWe're supposed to set daily word goals? Crap. Well I'm in trouble...
ReplyDeleteI've tried that in the past, writing to fulfill an arbitrary goal but what usually ends up happening is that a lot of what I end up writing tends to be filler, words written just to fill up the page, and in the end it just becomes more stuff to be deleted in the editing process.
I'm not saying its not a good idea or that setting these word counts isn't a useful for some writers, but personally, it's never really worked out for me.
As for words that count, I would say only words written for a purely creative purpose should count. My $0.02
Personally I would use only creative words not every day life writing. I answer emails for most of the day as my job and would not count that in my creative tally.
ReplyDeleteI also think is is a personal thing and depends on why you are doing it. As habit forming some say... eg, one hour a day. Those with a goal to reach can set word counts to make sure they are constantly going ahead. Everybody is inspired a different way. To me the important thing is to set a goal you can reach or stretch yourself to, and be happy with it.
Brenda (Akasha) f2k