Writers write. That’s the bottom line.
Last week was my most prolific week of 2018. I wrote more than 12,000 words, crossing the 10,000-word mark for the first time this year. I’ve been surprised over the course of the year at the steadiness of my pace–writing between 7,000 and 9,000 words every week. Of course, I’m particularly pleased to exceed that. The extra writing is definitely due to my return to fiction writing, which comes more easily and quickly than blog-writing or writing for magazines or newspapers. It’s a much freer, train-of-thought kind of writing, at least for me. Characters have a way of writing themselves, especially when they’ve been placed in vivid worlds with good rules and norms.
In addition to getting thousands of words down in fiction projects, I primarily wrote about the theology of the Calvinist charismatic (I’m reading Sam Storms’ book “Convergence” as well as some work by John Macarthur to better understand this practical and theological perspective). For the newspaper, I’m writing a City Living piece. It’s a column in which we look at specific intersections in Chicago and zero in on interesting restaurants, bars, people, and cultural spots in a micro-neighborhood. 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 8: 142 words (fiction)
Monday, April 9: 1,560 words (blog, fiction, and journalism)
Tuesday, April 10: 1,164 words (fiction)
Wednesday, April 11: 2,615 words (blog and fiction)
Thursday, April 12: 4,109 words (blog and fiction)
Friday, April 13: 2,269 words (blog, fiction, and journalism)
Saturday, April 14: 300 words (journalism)
Week 15 (April 8 – 14) Totals
Last week, I wrote 12,159 words and spent about 7 and a half hours writing, averaging 1,639 words per hour.
2018 Totals
Since the beginning of 2018, I’ve written about 115,816 words and spent approximately 80 hours writing.
Published Writing From Last Week
A Theology of Refuge: How the Good Samaritan Helps Us Come Alongside Refugees – We should ask, Who is the neighbor to refugees? I’d like to raise two points of action that will help to shape our truly neighborly perspective on refugeeism and our intimate relation to it: intentional neighborliness and sacrificial neighborliness.
The Sin of Samwise Gamgee – Sam’s sin is a temptation to us all. His disdain and distrust for Smeagol blinds him to any hope for Gollum, and condemns Gollum to a dreary end indeed.
Assessing My Writing Goals After Three Months – Q1 – My writing goals at the beginning of the year were to 1) maintain my blog to the tune of at least two posts per week and 2) e-publish a book. After three months, here’s an assessment of how I’m doing.
Three Views on Tax Reform – Today is Tax Day, and I’m reminded of Arnold Kling’s book “The Three Languages of Politics”. Here’s how Kling believes conservatives, progressives, and libertarians view tax reform.
Writing Tracker – Week 14 (April 1 – 7) – 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; what the gig economy might mean for Christians specifically; and I hope to 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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