Writer, do you have a minimum daily writing goal or quota? Do you write every day, take a day off per week, or does your schedule vary?
8 thoughts on “Reader Friday: Your Daily Writing Quota?”
Depends on where I am in the process. First draft, every day but one (it can vary), but a low minimum – 250 words. I usually surpass it.
Then it gets put away for a month before the rewrites start. No word count for this, but a butt in chair every day demand. And that’s it for discipline.
Weekly quota of 6k, take Sunday off. So I try to average 1k a day, but can tweak that as needed if some days get “life interference.”
Every day, I write something. I set a final word count target for my WIP, but not interim word quotas, such as daily or weekly. Instead, I write up a daily content goal, every morning over breakfast, such as: add a scene that shows the heroine is bonding with co-workers (I write in scenes, rather than chapters); add more tension to scene X; enhance the likable qualities of character X. Then I brainstorm options for completing that day’s goal during my daily 2 hour walk.
Varying schedule, 4000-5000 words per week, mostly at night and on weekends.
My daily goal used to be 3500 words. I used to be able to meet it. Sometimes I churn out close to 6000 words if I’m in a really good mood.
But I find that with each new project, it gets harder and harder to meet that goal. One would think the more you write the easier it gets. For me, that’s not the case. So I knocked my daily word count down to 2, 500 per day, and it has been working out good so far. On days when life interferes, I try to get at least 1000 words down. On days when I get less than 1000 words written, I pout, feeling like it was a complete waste of a day.
On Sundays, I do absolutely nothing at all but catch up on my favorite TV shows.
If I’m writing a minimum of 5k words per day. If I’m editing, at least one chapter. That means I can finish my first draft in about three months and edit an entire novel in about a month. Or at least that’s the plan.
I don’t have a quota or I’d disappoint myself. My writing schedule is dictated by what happens at the job which pays my bills and feeds me! I wish I could rely on myself to push and write, inspire my inner muse. That would be an awesome job to have! 😀
First draft-I shoot for 3k. On my current wip I’m lucky if I get a 1000. 🙂 Hopefully that will change next week.
Depends on where I am in the process. First draft, every day but one (it can vary), but a low minimum – 250 words. I usually surpass it.
Then it gets put away for a month before the rewrites start. No word count for this, but a butt in chair every day demand. And that’s it for discipline.
Weekly quota of 6k, take Sunday off. So I try to average 1k a day, but can tweak that as needed if some days get “life interference.”
Every day, I write something. I set a final word count target for my WIP, but not interim word quotas, such as daily or weekly. Instead, I write up a daily content goal, every morning over breakfast, such as: add a scene that shows the heroine is bonding with co-workers (I write in scenes, rather than chapters); add more tension to scene X; enhance the likable qualities of character X. Then I brainstorm options for completing that day’s goal during my daily 2 hour walk.
Varying schedule, 4000-5000 words per week, mostly at night and on weekends.
My daily goal used to be 3500 words. I used to be able to meet it. Sometimes I churn out close to 6000 words if I’m in a really good mood.
But I find that with each new project, it gets harder and harder to meet that goal. One would think the more you write the easier it gets. For me, that’s not the case. So I knocked my daily word count down to 2, 500 per day, and it has been working out good so far.
On days when life interferes, I try to get at least 1000 words down. On days when I get less than 1000 words written, I pout, feeling like it was a complete waste of a day.
On Sundays, I do absolutely nothing at all but catch up on my favorite TV shows.
If I’m writing a minimum of 5k words per day. If I’m editing, at least one chapter. That means I can finish my first draft in about three months and edit an entire novel in about a month. Or at least that’s the plan.
I don’t have a quota or I’d disappoint myself. My writing schedule is dictated by what happens at the job which pays my bills and feeds me! I wish I could rely on myself to push and write, inspire my inner muse. That would be an awesome job to have! 😀
First draft-I shoot for 3k. On my current wip I’m lucky if I get a 1000. 🙂 Hopefully that will change next week.