Reasonable word count goal = Win
I’ve been keeping with my word count goals, and writing at least 1k each day. I had initially came down from doing National Novel Writing Month thinking that I would write 3,000 words per day, but I quickly found out that is not a good day-to-day pace for me. Somehow November has a magical way of pulling very high word counts from me, but outside of November, my pace is not as hasty, which probably is a good thing. So, I’d said to myself, I’ll do 2,000 words a day, but still I couldn’t quite push myself to do that (especially since my computer is in the repair shop aka Geek Squad right now, and I’m either using my husband’s computer or writing longhand).
Dropping down my word count goal to 1,000 words a day (seven days a week) has been good for me right now. It’s enough that I’m making progress each day, but it’s not enough to take away from time with family or to stress me out. I can make it each day because if I overshoot my word count goal to something that I can’t consistently do, then I would just end up stressing out and beating myself up when I didn’t hit my goal. That would make me procrastinate, and I’d not really want to write, which would drag me out of the story and then I’d be in a bad spot creatively.
Making goals is important, and everyone should make goals that push them to succeed. Just remember not to make ones that you can’t feasibly meet. There’s a better chance that you will freeze and end up not achieving your goals. =)