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Should you count words or time? Word count goals set you up to fail. Set a 10-minute timer instead, and the words will follow.
Transcript
If you set a word count goal, you may sabotage yourself.
Here is the problem. You cannot control how many words show up on a given day. Some days the writing flows. Some days it does not. When you promise yourself 1,000 words and deliver 200, you feel like a failure, even when those 200 were good work.
So try a timer instead. Set it for 10 minutes and write. That is the whole goal. Show up for 10 minutes.
This works because you can always keep a time promise. You cannot always keep a word promise. One depends on you. The other depends on the muse.
And here is the strange part. When you stop counting words, more words come. The pressure lifts, and the writing flows.
I have drafted whole books this way, 10 minutes at a time.
So set the timer and forget the count. Just write.
