Tip 2: Track Your Progress

Daily writing seems endless – there’s always another day ahead, after all. So, how do you stay motivated? Here’s my second tip for the Daily 30:

“Keep track of your work.”

Having proof of your daily effort can really help keep you going.

Looking Back With a Smile

We’ve already discussed how daily writing, for me, works most effectively if there isn’t a fixed word count to reach. However, that doesn’t mean we can’t keep track of what we do every day. Every word counts, after all, so we might as well acknowledge that on paper!

When I started my thirty minutes for the first time years and years ago, I bought myself a teeny tiny planner to keep track. Every year since, I’ve bought a new one.

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Looking for a planner? I love De Hobbit’s A7 agendas. They’re small, so I can take them anywhere, but they still give me enough space to note down what I’ve done in a day.

Now, whenever I want, I can look back on every day I’ve written over the past 10 years and see what I worked on.

What Should You Track?

It’s up to you! The main purpose of tracking your writing is to remind yourself of all the work you’ve already done.

Still, if you’d like a general idea, here’s what I track:

The project I worked on (title or draft title)
The time I spent writing that day (30 minutes, or more)
The number of words I wrote

As my writing journey and goals changed, the things I tracked changed as well. I’d write down the number of pages in my notebook I’d dedicated to writing. I’d mention the amount of work I edited instead of new stuff I’d written. I’d track any composing I worked on once I started to move into spoken word.

In short: your tracker doesn’t have to look like mine at all. It can be a booklet, it can be a calendar on your wall, it can be in your phone. As long as it works for you and helps you get motivated to fill it in every day.

Learning From Your Past

Aside from tracking your progress as a form of motivation, it can of course also give you helpful insights into your own writing.

Are there any particular days when you wrote for much longer than those 30 minutes? What about the days when your word count is low – is there a pattern? As we’ve already established, there’s no need to hit a certain word count, but if you want to solve some hiccups in your process, your tracker can be a key tool.

I have used the data I collected to get a sense of how many words I’m realistically able to write in half an hour. I can see how long it takes on average to edit a manuscript in full, which helps me plan ahead. I’ve even found a project I once loved that I completely forgot about by leafing through my tracker (it’s now published – yay!).

Writing Prompt: An Old Artefact

Tracking the past can help your future – and that’s the idea behind this week’s writing prompt. Feel free to use it as inspiration!

“This changes everything…”
Your character finds an old artefact. How does it affect them?

Paper Proof

If there’s one object that, to me, encapsulates the Daily 30, it’s my planner. Those tiny journals are the physical representation of a writing habit I’m proud of – and I’d advise anyone else to get something similar. You might not look back at them much, but it does feel good to have paper proof of all the work we’re putting in.

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Priscilla Kint