#AHundredOrDie

I've had several conversations with my writing friends lately about how everyone's writing process is different. That's why there's so much writing advice out there. We're all trying to find our way, and when we find something that works for us, we want to share it with everyone else.

I've never been the type of writer who can switch between projects easily. Before I had an agent, that wasn't a big deal, because I was the only person who cared what I was writing and when. Now, though, I'm accountable to someone else. So in the fall, when my agent gave me revision notes on my manuscript, I dropped the WIP I had been working on all summer and threw myself into revisions.

But after the revisions were done, it was not as easy to throw myself back into the WIP. With the holidays and everything, I ended up taking a three month break from it. I wanted to get back to work. I just couldn't.

And then I noticed some of the writer people I follow on Twitter using a hashtag I hadn't seen before: #AHundredOrDie. I tried just stalking them for a little while to figure out what it was all about, but I eventually broke down and asked (human interaction! so stressful!). Beau (@INukeYou) started doing it in December to get out of a writing rut. Basically, the idea was to commit to writing at least a hundred words a day. The rationalization was that a hundred words was manageable no matter what kind of day he was having.

I agreed. A hundred words is nothing. I mean, the word count for the first two paragraphs I wrote for this post is over a hundred words. Over the next few days, a little over a hundred words at a time, I got through my writer's block and was able to make real progress in my WIP. Some days I only wrote a hundred words. Other days I wrote over a thousand. But I made sure I wrote every day. Having accountability buddies is a strategy many writers use, and this one was the perfect amount of casual commitment for me.

It helped (is helping!) me so much, and that is why I wanted to share it with you. Will it work for everyone? No writing advice does. But if you are feeling stuck, or feeling guilty for not writing, try to write a hundred words. We'll cheer you on at #AHundredOrDie.