Write or Die: Your New Favorite Tool
Tomorrow is I Love To Write Day. Yay for people who love to write! But guess what? Some very successful authors don’t like writing. Or find writing difficult. Or write veeeery, veeeery slowly.
But whether you love writing or find it painful, soon or later you will face that accursed foe: writer’s block. You have things to write. You know you should write. But somehow you can’t make it happen.
Many successful writers will tell you that the key to unblocking is discipline. Force yourself to write for a certain amount of time each day, whether you feel like it or not. Write junk or write a masterpiece, just write.
Cue Write or Die from the Dr. Wicked Writing Lab.
Wrote or Die is a simple (dare I say wickedly simple?) online application that helps you set a goal and get it written. You choose either the number of words you want to complete or a time limit. Set your grace period to Forgiving, Strict or Evil, and then set your punishment mode: Gentle, Normal, or Kamikaze. With Gentle, you get a nice little pop-up window if you stop for too long. On the Kamikaze setting, your words start to erase themselves. Talk about incentive!
The tool is a great boost for just letting loose with ideas, getting words on the screen, and gaining momentum. Later you can go back to edit and refine.
I used the tool myself to write this post, and the idea that I’d be buzzed if I didn’t keep going provided just enough push to keep my fingers flying. It was kind of fun, actually.
The tool has a secondary benefit as well: it helps you identify the habits that might be slowing you down. I couldn’t believe how much I was trying to erase and re-write things I had started, and how often I stopped to re-read what I’d just written. Fighting those urges will help me be more a productive writer.
I can see Write or Die becoming a tremendous tool for authors. Set yourself a goal of a page or a chapter and see how far you can get with just letting the ideas flow. It’s always easier to edit than to create, and a session with Dr. Wicked gives you the raw material you need for getting started.
When you’re done, you get a gratifying note that tells you how many words you wrote in what amount of time. I was a bit surprised to learn that I had written this whole post in 8 minutes. And surprisingly, it took less editing than I thought to make it ready for publishing.
Tags: Write or Die, writer's block, writing tool