750 Words

So, I've been writing my morning pages on the website 750 words. I was up to a 55 day streak, and just a few days away from completing the month of June without missing a day. I was a happy Albatross (30 days in a row) well on my way to receiving the Pteradactyl badge (100 days in a row) when... yes, I missed yesterday! Sigh... I woke up this morning with a sinking feeling in my stomach. Maybe I just forgot that I wrote something yesterday? I remember thinking about it several times yesterday but when I logged in... alas... I definitely wrote nothing yesterday. And now, I have lost my lofty Albatross status and am back to being an Egg... Sigh... Well, today is a new day and it's time to dust myself off and try again!

Amazing how well it works, these little badge incentives. I really do not find it burdensome to sit down and write my 750 words, mostly because it only takes me 7 or 8 minutes on the computer, whereas 3 long-hand pages takes at least 30 minutes. Funny how that happens. Maybe I need to actually write on the computer for 30 minutes to match long-hand writing? That would be an awful lot of words!!

Morning Pages

If you read any sort of meditation or writing or self-help type of stuff, most of them will tell you to journal. Now, when they say to journal, they don't mean necessarily having a coherent, it-has-to-make-sense type of journal. They're talking about just sitting down and writing whatever is there, complete with spelling mistakes and whatever else might come. Julia Cameron, author of The Artist's Way, recommends what she calls Morning Pages. They are 3 pages of long-hand writing to just get it all out on paper. Do it first thing in the morning when you're still groggy and not thinking clearly. Just get it all out of your system, all of the things you need to do today, all of your worries and concerns and fears. Just get it out.

Then, once that's done, you can get on with your day and the serious business of real writing (if that's what you want to do). So, I've done morning pages off and on, but they don't seem to always be consistent... or I don't seem to be consistent. In my surfing of the net the other day, I came across another option, which I like a lot. It's called 750 Words (http://750words.com/). Just sign up (you can use your Facebook account for this), and you're good to go. At 250 words/page, the guy figures that 750 words is 3 pages. So, you can just sit and type in 750 words and it'll save it for you (safely and securely). Over time, you get points (always a bonus!) and it will keep track of some stats for you. It's very easy to use and I am liking it a lot! (I think I said that already).

I like the fact that I can do this on the computer. I type way faster than I write long-hand and my fingers can actually keep up with my thoughts. Maybe others are purists about having to write it all on paper, but I like this idea. And so far (2 days into it), it's working for me!

So if you've tried Morning Pages and find yourself struggling with the whole paper thing, give this website a try!