Writers write. That’s the bottom line.
What a difference a week makes! Looking over the first three months of 2018, I really got into a groove with this blog. I have enjoyed posting so frequently and the writing has been a real pleasure–exceeding the goal I set for myself at the start of the year (two blogposts per week). However, my fiction writing dropped off dramatically. As such, at the start of April I wanted to try to re-calibrate, trying to find a balance between writing for the blog, journalism, and my fiction work. I may have overcompensated this week, doing more fiction writing than anything else, but I’ll take it.
So, yes, got back into a fiction novel I’m working on, which has been a nice change of pace. I also wrote a bit about Martin Luther King Jr, especially in light of the 50th anniversary of his assassination. And I wrote about the difference between teaching and preaching, which is something I’ve been thinking about lately. Once again, I didn’t return to my Bonhoeffer pieces or the series about how the Kingdom might intersect with the Kardashev scale. Hopefully I’ll return to them soon. Check out all the new words and please share!
Words Per Day
Sunday, April 1: 0 words
Monday, April 2: 3,794 words (blog and journalism)
Tuesday, April 3: 1,314 words (fiction)
Wednesday, April 4: 1,655 words (fiction and journalism)
Thursday, April 5: 1,103 words (fiction)
Friday, April 6: 1,414 words (fiction)
Saturday, April 7: 0 words
Week 14 (April 1 – 7) Totals
Last week, I wrote 9,280 words and spent about 6 and a half hours writing, averaging 1,409 words per hour.
2018 Totals
Since the beginning of 2018, I’ve written about 104,000 words and spent approximately 73 hours writing.
Published Writing From Last Week
A Theology of Refuge: Seeing Refugees in the Radical Light of Pentecost – The Spirit that came to us at Pentecost is the same Spirit that directs us to refugees. The radical help, radical accompaniment, and radical sustenance of the third person of the Trinity in each Christian can be activated by the Church toward refugees. The result is radical hope.
How Did Martin Luther King Deal with Constant Threats? – “I must face the fact, as all others in positions of leadership must do, that America today is an extremely sick nation, and that something could well happen to me at any time. I feel, though, that my cause is so right, so moral, that if I should lose my life, in some way it would aid the cause.” – MLK Jr.
The First Time Martin Luther King Saw the Power of Nonviolence – One of the most incredible things about Martin Luther King Jr. is the fact that he believed nonviolence was the way even before he experienced its full weight. He felt it in his bones before he saw it with his eyes. He trusted even before he saw the fruit.
The Things We Do Instead of Writing – Here are some of the things that get in the way of my writing. And even though they’re not bad things—in fact, for the most part, these are good things—they are, at the end of the day, not writing.
Writing Tracker – Week 13 (March 25 – 31) – Follow along as I track progress toward my writing goals. Here’s an update from the sixth week of the year.
Here’s What’s Coming Up
In the near future, I’m planning to write more in my series about the Kardashev Scale, which I’ve been steadily plugging away at, and how it might come into contact with the Kingdom of God. I’m also working on pieces related to Bonhoeffer’s theology and how it may be applicable today; the significance of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “crusade” of nonviolence; what the gig economy might mean for Christians specifically; and I may return to my piece about a movie on Netflix I watched with my wife called “The Heart of Man.”
Why Sharing Your Goals Is Important
Accountability: Because my writing goals for 2018 are to 1) post at least twice per week on this blog and 2) publish a book online, I know that I need to hold myself accountable and be held accountable by others. Making my writing statistics is one way for me to do that. With my writing production out in the open, others can see if I’m keeping up. If I’m not, they can give me the necessary encouragement/kick. Posting my stats also keeps me personally motivated. I don’t want to be embarrassed by falling behind my goals in public!
Inspiration: Assuming I can maintain my writing production at a level I’m satisfied with, I hope it will be an inspiration to other writers. I work full-time and have a number of ongoing commitments, but because writing is important to me, I make the time. You can too. Even 15-minute writing sprints over the course of weeks and months really adds up.
Data Tracking: I love seeing trends in data almost as much as I love writing. Amateur data analysis is incredibly easy today, and I love to see my numbers crunched. It’s fun and fascinating, but it also helps me write. Tracking my writing means I know how much I can write per genre, per hours; I know my pace; I know how much time I’m actually dedicating to writing; and I can see how my writing accumulates and improves over time.
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