by Charlie Fabre
In 2024, I’ve decided to write 40k words in 100 days.
I’ve set writing goals for myself in the past, all to varying degrees of success. I’ve participated in Nanowrimo, with no success, but this goal is actually sticking so far!
At first glance it sounds kind of insane – 40k words is about the length I want my manuscript to be, and 100 days is so few! But in reality, it’s only 400 words a day, and thinking about it that way makes it so much less daunting.
This challenge was my coworkers’ idea. He and I both work in marketing as copywriters, and we both have unfinished manuscripts. We decided that 2024 was going to be the year we’d do it – that way we could maybe get a shot at being published, but also just move on to other projects. We started on January 2nd, and so far so good!
We’ve set ourselves some rules to help us along the way, and I’ll be sharing mine now so that you can join the challenge as well!
1 – Write everyday
Obviously, this is the most important as it’s the whole point. Every day I write at least 400 words. Some days inspiration might strike, or I might have more time, so I go beyond 400, but if all I can manage one day is that 400 then that’s okay, and I can call that a success.
This is great because it only really takes me half an hour to do, so it’s not crazy time-consuming which I think was a major obstacle in past writing challenges. Time is everything when you write, and these short bursts have been a game changer.
2 – No editing
I am the WORST when it comes to editing. I constantly edit as I write and become hypercritical which just hinders my progress and, sometimes, completely halts it. So, during the week, I will not be editing at all. I’ll write my 400 words a day, and once that’s done, it’s done, and I won’t open the document or notebook until the next day.
On Sunday’s I will be doing some light editing work, however, just to make sure that everything is on track. My coworker and I have decided to periodically send each other what we’ve written that week as well so we can get an outside perspective and make any important changes if needed. But, as a general rule, this editing shouldn’t be too in depth – we’ll save that for when the challenge is done!
3 – Outlines!!!
The above is all well and good, but what can easily happen is your story getting away from you. If you’re writing without editing then it’s easy for you to lose sight of the plot and start writing scenes that don’t fit the overall narrative.
That’s why, at the end of the week, I’ll be reading the week’s progress and writing a very loose outline for the following week. I don’t want to be too strict with this as I still want to let the story go where it wants, but you need some boundaries otherwise you may end up with 40k words of nonsense at the end – and then what will it all have been for?
4 – Have a buddy, but remember it’s not a competition
Having a writing buddy, even if it’s just one person, is soooo good when it comes to keeping yourself accountable. I don’t know about you guys, but I am constantly setting solo goals for myself and then giving up half-way through. Having a buddy will help to keep you going: you can give each other encouragement, and when it gets hard you know you’re in it with someone else.
Just make sure it doesn’t turn into anything viscous. This isn’t a competition – you’re writing different things, and you’re different people. Just because one of you writes 600 words in a day and the other only writes 400 doesn’t mean one is better than the other. This is a partnership, not a championship.
5 – Take it easy
If you do all the above, then this rule becomes easy. You just have to remember that this is for fun and this is for yourself – not anyone else. If there’s a day you feel like you just can’t write at all, that’s okay. Exercise the skill and the story in some other way if you can, or just take the day to rest. You can catch up another day, and if you don’t that’s completely fine.
40k is the goal my coworker and I have set, but it’s not meant to be literal. Having a concrete goal is better than having a loose one, which is why we chose this number, but if at the end of it we end up only getting to 30k, it’ll still be an achievement we’re proud of.
swim press 