I mentioned in my post on New Year’s Day that I was going to be doing challenge to write on average 2,024 words a day in 2014.  How’s that going?

Well, I’m behind already.

The key term here is “on average”. On January 2 I had to make a delivery for one of my dayjobs. This was to a town approximately an hour’s drive to the west. Under normal circumstances, that is. It was half na hour longer because the brdige over the lake west of town is closed and I had to take a detour. Just a few days before Christmas, a guy fishing in a boat saw part of it fall into the water. Instant shutdown. (The bridge is supposed to be open by Monday. We’ll see.)

The rain and fog and construction on the interstate didn’t help for a quick trip.  On the way back, I got a call from the boss asking me if I could make another delivery, this one to a city two and a half hours (one way) in the other direction. Always motivated by the possiblility of making some filthy lucre, I said yes.

I would have made it back in time to get some writing in, but I had to change a flat and return on a donut. (It was the boss’s vehicle.) I got in at midnight.

Remember, the key term here is “on average”.

I’ve made progress in catching up and should be close to where I should be at the end of today. Of course, I’m going to a wedding out of town tomorrow, so…

So, what’s the point of this post as well as the point of the challenge?

There’s a really good chance I won’t be able to keep up the pace of 2,024 words a day. If you’ve ever participated in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), you’ll know that to write fifty thousand words in a month, you need to write 1,667 words a day. On average.

This challenge is a little like NaNoWriMo on steroids. For a whole year. I’m usually a little burned out by the end of NaNoWriMo and am ready for a break.  I’ve put things off and not done other things. The end of November is when the writing usually grinds to a halt.

So, why am I doing this to myself?

Because if I’m going to fail, I’m going to fail to success. I may crash and burn early one. It’s possible, but it’s not a possibililty I’m going to dwell on or consider. That type of negative thinking is jsut setting myself up for failure.

The goal is to find a way to motivate myself to keep writing. And publishing, but there’s no requirement to publish in this particular challenge. The key here is the motivation to write.

That’s why I’m doing the challenge. It’s also why I’m doing it out in public. What I mean by that is I’m letting you all know I’m doing it. The embarrassment of not completing the challenge is a type of negative motivation in that there’s not a reward but a sort of punishment.

The goal is to succeed by writng more words than I otherwise would have if I weren’t doing this challenge.

That’s what I mean by failing to success.