Pushing Your Writing – 750words(.com) at a time

Sing along now, everyone: “writers have to write.”

Pretty solid advice, by most standards, and the sort of mantra worth drilling into the skull of any poor sod writing for a living. Four years of university forced me to flex the creative muscle on a weekly basis, putting pen to paper for at least a few hours each day, but graduation paints a different picture entirely. This came as a shocker, but – and hold on to your hats, folks! – apparently I’m kind of lazy.

But that’s okay! Sometimes writers don’t want to write. Sometimes we want to sink into the couch and soothe our tired minds with less productive pursuits. For those forced to slog through a typical work day, that kind of vegetative state might be more common than not. As those off days start to tally up, however, so does the guilt – a creeping sense of restlessness, one only assuaged by sitting down and churning out some verbs.

How about we skip that guilt entirely? Writing every single day doesn’t always come easy, but it’s a battle-tested tool for fighting through writer’s block and helping to cultivate your personal style. And, with a website like 750words, even a shiftless writer like myself can stay well on track!

The concept of morning pages originated with Julia Cameron in her book The Artist’s Way, a process which tasks writers and creative folks of every stripe to touch base with their innate talent by writing three pages of mindless content every morning. Sounds strange, but it’s a great way to reawaken your latent creativity – in your sleepy state, the little voice that criticizes your work is often muted, allowing you to develop your skills without interference from that pesky thing between your ears. 750words adapts that same idea for the internet, providing you with an appealing blank screen and a little counter on the bottom right to chart your progress.

The goal is simple: write 750 words. They can be about anything, of course, and rest assured they exist for your eyes only. My daily pages often take the tone of a diary, but that’s just dandy – I’m writing, at least, and 750words provides a neat page of stats for me to skim whenever I’m done. The site employs computerized text analysis systems to show you the emotions that come through your words, as an example, and even your tendency to write about certain subjects versus the rest of the world. I’m proud to say I write about death slightly less than the rest of the planet!

The stats come formatted in pretty charts and graphs, making them both a pleasure to view and ponder. You’ll even receive various ‘awards’ in the form of animal icons for maintaining streaks of daily writing, and you also have the option to participate in the monthly challenge, whereby you strive to write every day for a month and give yourself a big fat pat on the back at the end.

You’ll find my name on the ‘Wall of Shame’ for the May’s challenge. I don’t want to talk about it.

All in all, 750words is a pretty nifty tool for writers. Rant about your ex, fiddle with flash fiction, or keep progressing on your latest novel – 750words provides a perfect home for your output, one that encourages a lazy author like me to keep writing every day of the week. Putting pen to paper on a regular basis is one of the best practices a writer can follow, so consider this a heartfelt recommendation to check the site out.

Image courtesy of 750words Facebook page.