Years ago, in a graduate-level writing workshop, a classmate asked the professor how to build a sustainable writing practice. The professor replied that the best way wasn’t by word counts or these big, grandiose goals of two hours. Creativity ebbs and flows, and some days, you might spend all your time wrestling with one sentence, or you’re stuck, or you have inspiration and the words pour out of you. He said the most sustainable writing practice he’d found was simply to commit to writing twenty minutes every day. Everyone has twenty minutes they can carve out of their day, even on their busiest days. Some days, you might want to continue. Some days might be spent picking apart one sentence, one paragraph, one page.
As you might imagine, this idea was very attractive to me. Twenty minutes? I can do twenty minutes! Over the years, I’ve fallen in and out of the practice, but this summer, I’m starting again, alongside of my dear friend Kyrie McCauley. We thought it might be fun to invite you to join along with us, and after brainstorming a bit: the #Write2021 Challenge was born.
This summer, I’ll be drafting again, and hoping to complete a new book to send to my agent. Kyrie’s in the same boat, and we’ll be checking in on each other’s progress throughout the month of June on Instagram using the hashtag #Write2021 (as in, Write 20 in 2021) .
During the month of June, we’re challenging ourselves to build a sustainable writing practice by committing to our craft for 20 minutes every day, and we’d love for you to join us! We’ll be hosting special prompts and live events on Wednesdays and Sundays – check out the schedule below:
Write-In Wednesdays: Prompts & Writing Advice (themes listed on the instagram post) and join us for a live write-in from 8-8:30EST on June 2, 9, 16, and 30! Sign up here for the write-ins!
Sunday Share: Each week, share something about your WIP! Prompts include snippets, aesthetics, and song comps.
Join in the fun by following your hosts, @KyrieMcCauley and @JennyPerinovic. Post your responses to the prompts (and share your daily wins!) by using the #write2021 hashtag. We can’t wait to see what you create!
💜