So as most of you guys know, I am a creature of habit (not all of the habits are good and healthy, but I digress) and I don’t particularly welcome change. Oddly enough I am also the same person who welcomes a challenge (within reason of course—I don’t do these popular social media ones)) and likes to see how far I can be pushed. Being a part of the AuthorTube community on YouTube (and if you haven’t checked out my channel, feel free to do so after reading this) there are a lot of challenges and ways they make sure to get their fellow writers motivated to be more productive. It’s almost impossible to not demand productivity of yourself when you are a part of a writing community that is just so extremely productive and they keep finding vastly different ways to produce.
So a new challenge has come up in the AuthorTube community by an AuthorTuber named Kate Cavanaugh called the MilWordy challenge and the goal is to write a million words over the next year, starting September 1, 2020. This includes all words, both fiction and non-fiction (or creative non-fiction), as well as blog posts and newsletters, poetry, and editing. So as daunting as this sounds, I have actually decided to dive right into this and I’m going to be honest and say that I don’t think that I will actually get to a million words, however, for me that is not the point. Largely what I have found within this community is accountability and ways to hold myself to a certain standard that even I myself am not sure that I can achieve.
The whole point is to try. I mean if I achieve even half of this goal then that is more than likely far more words than I would’ve gotten had I not done the challenge. But also, what if I actually complete this goal? How many projects would I have finished then? How many books will be set to be published? How many new projects that I was supposed to have started by now could I not only start but actually get started on and maybe even complete? I want to push myself and this is a good way to do that.
Challenges are good for that. They make us, at the very least, attempt the things that we have programmed ourselves to think are impossible. Challenges make us raise our own standards and stop expecting the bare minimum of what we have to offer this world. Challenges, both the ones that are thrown at us and the one’s in which we impose on ourselves, are what help us to grow as people.
What or who has challenged you on your journey? Have you resisted that challenge or did you allow yourself to lean in? I hope that any of you writers out there that read this perhaps click on the link in this post to Kate’s video and check out the details of the challenge or if not make your own challenge to see just how much you can achieve if you push yourself to. Let’s see how far we can get if we just pushed a little past what we expected of ourselves! Until next time… #BeBold #BeCourageous #BeMotivated
Jimmetta Carpenter
Writer/Editor
http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310
https://www.facebook.com/Write2BeMagazine
https://www.facebook.com/AuthorJCCarpenter
Write 2 Be 