A Writing Commitment

Inspired by my good friend and fellow Blogger, Angie Richmond, I’ve decided to make a real commitment — an Unresolution if you will (check out Angie’s blog post on Unresolutions and you’ll get the idea) — to writing. A commitment to writing in general, that is. Whether it’s following through with outlining an idea that comes to me late at night while I’m trying to fall asleep, posting regularly on this blog, or plugging away at my numerous works in progress, I am going to try — no I will — stop making excuses for neglecting my only true hobby (let alone semi-talent if it is true that I have one at all) and get down to writing-business.






To help me keep my word and on Angie’s advice, I’ve enlisted myself to two different writing challenges that require me to — gasp! — write. The first of which was created by Cara Michaels and is called the #WIP500 challenge. Essentially, writers desiring some degree of accountability to themselves and their craft, sign on with the goal of writing at least 500 words per day. Given my track record of writing at random whenever inspiration strikes (and with my day job and the recent holidays, inspiration has seldom managed to slice through the realities of day-to-day life to assist me with writing) 500 words EVERY DAY (and every day is the catch) is a real commitment for me.






The second challenge I’ve committed to is called the Five Sentence Fiction challenge and was created by Lillie McFerrin. Each week, McFerrin posts a new theme on her blog and participants write a five sentence story utilizing that theme. Now, I’ve always been a sprinter. Long-distance or long-term anything be it writing, running, exercising, healthy eating, or heck even organization has posed challenging for me. So naturally, I right away liked the idea of completing an entire story, an entire work of fiction in five sentences! What a great idea I thought to myself when I first heard about it.






Then I actually had to write five sentences. Let’s just say it was a little trickier than I had anticipated.






Check back tomorrow to see how I fared with my first Five Sentence Fiction challenge. The theme? HUNGER.