Last summer, I set out to write at least 750 words a day for an entire year. This goal kept me writing daily through thick and thin. Neither rain, nor sleet, nor aching wrists stopped me from pounding on my keyboard each morning until at least 750 words had been written.

This morning I awoke with a realization— I had failed.

750 Words

750 Words is a website that I came across last year when I was looking for tools to help cut out the distractions while writing. Unlike many other distraction-free writing apps, 750 words is web-based, which means it can be used anywhere a web browser can.

750 Words is great

As may be divined from the name of the site, this is where I got my actual number for the amount words to write per day. I knew that I wanted to create a habit of writing daily, but 750 Words put a concrete milestone in place, which always helps with goals.

750 Words was a real boon for me and my goal of writing every single day. The site introduces several elements that help to make writing 750 words on a daily basis a bit more like playing a game. While my main desire was to have an uncluttered place to write that was free from distraction, I will admit that the badges, monthly challenges, and (especially) the checkboxes that track your daily writing streak were helpful motivators, especially on days when I did not feel like writing.

Ultimately, these elements provided me with a visual representation of my daily progress and encouraged me to push through and get my writing done for the day.

The website is pretty much completely distraction free. I could post a screenshot, but all you’d see is a mostly white screen. At the bottom of the page is a counter to show you how many words you’ve written, but basically you’re given a blank canvas to write on and that’s about it.

OK, fine, here’s a screenshot of a (mostly) white screen

This is perfect for focusing on the words and the writing.

You can also customize the typeface, font size, and the colors for various elements (background, text, etc.) to make it even more conducive to writing.

750 Words has some drawbacks

Of course, being web-based, 750 Words also comes with all the disadvantages of any hosted application, such as:

Access

If your internet goes down or the server 750 Words is hosted on goes down, you lose access to your writing tool. If the internet is down at the wrong time, you may even risk breaking your streak because you couldn’t access the site to write before the day was over.

Thankfully, 750 Words will mend broken streaks that were the result of “Acts of God” (or server moves), which I had to request on one occasion (when the site recently moved to a new server).

Privacy

I may just be paranoid (I am), but I don’t believe anything on the internet is completely private. No matter how much encryption and security a site claims to use, there is always a new report about major sites being hacked and users’ private information (credit card numbers, bank information, etc.) being exposed.

750 Words make no claims about triple-padlocked 256-bit unbreakable encryption to protect your daily writings. That’s not to say that they don’t take your privacy seriously, but it does mean that we don’t know what safeguards may or may not be in place.

The point is that you are making the choice to put your personal (and potentially private) writing on someone else’s server. For some, this may be acceptable (e.g. Facebook users), for others, it may be too much of a leap of faith.

It’s The End

Ever since I started writing daily last summer, I have not missed a single day. Despite early mornings, busy schedules, and unforeseen events, I was still able to remember to do my writing each day and continue my streak.

That was, until yesterday.

Generally, I do my writing in the morning. I found that getting my wandering thoughts out of my head was a nice way to start the day, not to mention that I risked forgetting to write if I didn’t take care of it straightaway. Sometimes though, writing first thing in the morning just is not practical, and I need to find the time to do it later on.

Yesterday was such a day.

I don’t really have any excuses though. I was out all day, but was back home by the evening and had ample time to write. I simply forgot to do it and only realized it as I awoke this morning.

So my streak comes to an end with 323 days of consecutive writing totaling 296,923 words.

I did not reach my goal of 365 days of writing, but all is not lost. The primary goal from the start was to become more comfortable with getting my thoughts down on paper, which I knew would require consistent practice. Shooting for a year of straight writing was really just a peripheral goal to keep me going on days when I really did not feel like writing.

In this way, though it is bittersweet to be so close to reaching a milestone only to have it come to an abrupt and unexpected end due to a single instance of forgetfulness, I feel no regret because I have reached my primary goal in a way that far exceeded my expectations.

I am now comfortable with writing out my thoughts. Ideas flow much more freely and I have even discovered some strategies to help me get through potential hindrances such as writer’s block.

I also discovered many things about myself along the way through my daily writing, as providing an outlet for my thoughts often made room for new and revealing thoughts about myself and the things that motivate my actions.

A Fresh Start

Today marks the start of a new goal: Publish every day. As I said, my primary goal with writing daily was to become more comfortable with getting my thoughts and ideas out of my head. However, the reason for this was that I wanted to share those thoughts and ideas more readily. Holding ideas in does nothing but suffocate them and keep them from inspiring new ideas.

I want to get my thoughts out to make room for new ones.

Whether it be posting something on this site, a picture on Flickr, a video on Vimeo, or something via another outlet, I will publish something every day.

One Rule

Currently, I’m not counting tweets on Twitter as “publishing” because I don’t think talking about how much I like peanut butter (a lot) constitutes “sharing” in any constructive way. This may change in the future, but for now, 140 characters seems like too easy of a way to make my quota for the day.