At the end of every year of my newsletter I go back manually and add up all the words I've written for it over the last year. Every year it's at least a book's worth. Which serves to remind me that if I can manage to write twice a week for a handful of hours I can finish an entire draft's worth of words in a year. If I can find more hours than that I might be able to do it in less time, but a year is fine.
It's so easy to look at an entire manuscript length work and think "I could never write that many words", except I have, at least twice, since the newsletter is just over two years old. So, there goes that excuse. I find this helpful.
Have you seen this, on the intoxication of writing?
Troy Thompson
Be Drunk
Charles Baudelaire - 1821-1867
You have to be always drunk. That's all there is to it—it's the only way. So as not to feel the horrible burden of time that breaks your back and bends you to the earth, you have to be continually drunk.
But on what? Wine, poetry or virtue, as you wish. But be drunk.
And if sometimes, on the steps of a palace or the green grass of a ditch, in the mournful solitude of your room, you wake again, drunkenness already diminishing or gone, ask the wind, the wave, the star, the bird, the clock, everything that is flying, everything that is groaning, everything that is rolling, everything that is singing, everything that is speaking. . .ask what time it is and wind, wave, star, bird, clock will answer you: "It is time to be drunk! So as not to be the martyred slaves of time, be drunk, be continually drunk! On wine, on poetry or on virtue as you wish."
Great start! Better to throw everything down on the page before paring away what's unnecessary,then developing the rest by throwing more down on the page before paring away what's unnecessary, then developing the rest by....and when you can't pare down anymore and run out of necessary stuff to say, you're done.
This is all solid advice in my book. I find doing yoga is great for a mental reset and revealing what is making me feel bogged down. Also, about writing a lot taking energy and the need for recovery.
Hi Kate, I enjoyed reading about your success -- doing likewise is now a goal for me! Over the past weekend I had hours of time away from home with a congenial friend who was meeting a deadline for her 4th published mystery. I spent my writing time composing a long overdue email update about my 2nd book and hunting down chapters of that book I had filed "somewhere" on my computer, some time during Covid. In a few hours I had finished and sent the email and found the chapters! I also pulled out 6 key scenes and started analyzing them per Susan Scofield's advice in The Last Draft, p. 153. Next up--a day with an impressive word count like yours! Thanks for the inspiration.
2 --- February break! I recall as a youngin' in Rochester NY, the reasoning was that this was the coldest week of the winter and the break was to save on heating costs. But also--skiing.
Hooray for 6k and 40k!!!! Those are huge numbers, and you should be so proud. And the break was well-deserved.
I absolutely get copyediting hangovers, where I can't put another word into my brain or it will *explode*. I generally take Thursdays as a decompression day. (A decompression day that also involves my day job because capitalism never rests.)
Solidarity because I HATE this stupid winter break 😭😭 it’s February! In New York! It’s cold and gross out and there’s nothing fun to do and I’m still broke from Christmas!
If there’s one thing I’m really getting to grips with lately it’s that there’s just no status quo, or any of that business. You’ve just got to go with it all, not be afraid to give yourself a kick up the backside here and there, or indeed sit that very same backside down for a rest. Thanks for sharing!
I’ve started my Sunday/Thursday posts in an attempt to get neuro function back (or at least *mostly* back) after six months with long COVID hellish health. And WOW did this read resonate with me. Yes! REST is critical. Two years ago I worked myself silly doing accounting work for a vacation rental industry tanking throughout quarantine. Work kept me going (and the kids, and the hubby) but when I finally took a few months off a secure payroll, the rest washed over me like a cloud shielding a sunburned ass under the Texas sun.
Rest is everything. Now, with six months of (perhaps too much) rest under my skin, I’m leaning back into writing in order to resurrect my functional self.
I’ve learned that as I grow accustomed to potentially living forever with disability, in many ways, rest completes the writing before the work is done. I can’t draw water from a dry well. It feels mechanical — the way I have to force intense focus or chop and paste a post together. If one day I find it easier to get something worth reading out, the rest will have undoubtably carried me to that achievement.
We do what we do because we must, but when “must” becomes “bust” — do less! ♥️😂
At the end of every year of my newsletter I go back manually and add up all the words I've written for it over the last year. Every year it's at least a book's worth. Which serves to remind me that if I can manage to write twice a week for a handful of hours I can finish an entire draft's worth of words in a year. If I can find more hours than that I might be able to do it in less time, but a year is fine.
It's so easy to look at an entire manuscript length work and think "I could never write that many words", except I have, at least twice, since the newsletter is just over two years old. So, there goes that excuse. I find this helpful.
Have you seen this, on the intoxication of writing?
Troy Thompson
Be Drunk
Charles Baudelaire - 1821-1867
You have to be always drunk. That's all there is to it—it's the only way. So as not to feel the horrible burden of time that breaks your back and bends you to the earth, you have to be continually drunk.
But on what? Wine, poetry or virtue, as you wish. But be drunk.
And if sometimes, on the steps of a palace or the green grass of a ditch, in the mournful solitude of your room, you wake again, drunkenness already diminishing or gone, ask the wind, the wave, the star, the bird, the clock, everything that is flying, everything that is groaning, everything that is rolling, everything that is singing, everything that is speaking. . .ask what time it is and wind, wave, star, bird, clock will answer you: "It is time to be drunk! So as not to be the martyred slaves of time, be drunk, be continually drunk! On wine, on poetry or on virtue as you wish."
Oh... I LOVE this. It is astoundingly true.
Great start! Better to throw everything down on the page before paring away what's unnecessary,then developing the rest by throwing more down on the page before paring away what's unnecessary, then developing the rest by....and when you can't pare down anymore and run out of necessary stuff to say, you're done.
Yes! Agree. ❤️
This is all solid advice in my book. I find doing yoga is great for a mental reset and revealing what is making me feel bogged down. Also, about writing a lot taking energy and the need for recovery.
Hi Kate, I enjoyed reading about your success -- doing likewise is now a goal for me! Over the past weekend I had hours of time away from home with a congenial friend who was meeting a deadline for her 4th published mystery. I spent my writing time composing a long overdue email update about my 2nd book and hunting down chapters of that book I had filed "somewhere" on my computer, some time during Covid. In a few hours I had finished and sent the email and found the chapters! I also pulled out 6 key scenes and started analyzing them per Susan Scofield's advice in The Last Draft, p. 153. Next up--a day with an impressive word count like yours! Thanks for the inspiration.
Native NYer chiming in: Feb. break is a holdover from the oil crisis. They couldn't afford to heat the schools so they just sent kids home.
2 --- February break! I recall as a youngin' in Rochester NY, the reasoning was that this was the coldest week of the winter and the break was to save on heating costs. But also--skiing.
Hooray for 6k and 40k!!!! Those are huge numbers, and you should be so proud. And the break was well-deserved.
I absolutely get copyediting hangovers, where I can't put another word into my brain or it will *explode*. I generally take Thursdays as a decompression day. (A decompression day that also involves my day job because capitalism never rests.)
I had a similar writing day yesterday (more like night til 3am) and it was wonderful and exhausting and we must take these sprints for ourselves!
Solidarity because I HATE this stupid winter break 😭😭 it’s February! In New York! It’s cold and gross out and there’s nothing fun to do and I’m still broke from Christmas!
If there’s one thing I’m really getting to grips with lately it’s that there’s just no status quo, or any of that business. You’ve just got to go with it all, not be afraid to give yourself a kick up the backside here and there, or indeed sit that very same backside down for a rest. Thanks for sharing!
🤘🤘
I’ve started my Sunday/Thursday posts in an attempt to get neuro function back (or at least *mostly* back) after six months with long COVID hellish health. And WOW did this read resonate with me. Yes! REST is critical. Two years ago I worked myself silly doing accounting work for a vacation rental industry tanking throughout quarantine. Work kept me going (and the kids, and the hubby) but when I finally took a few months off a secure payroll, the rest washed over me like a cloud shielding a sunburned ass under the Texas sun.
Rest is everything. Now, with six months of (perhaps too much) rest under my skin, I’m leaning back into writing in order to resurrect my functional self.
I’ve learned that as I grow accustomed to potentially living forever with disability, in many ways, rest completes the writing before the work is done. I can’t draw water from a dry well. It feels mechanical — the way I have to force intense focus or chop and paste a post together. If one day I find it easier to get something worth reading out, the rest will have undoubtably carried me to that achievement.
We do what we do because we must, but when “must” becomes “bust” — do less! ♥️😂
Hey that’s awesome! I love those days! “I wrote 6,242 words over about 4 hours of writing time...”
Sweet!!!
Michael Mohr
‘The Incompatibility of Being Alive’
https://reallife82.substack.com/