Moving. That’s what broke my writing streak. And whiny children that don’t want to sleep at night in a new home they’re not familiar with and no melatonin to ease the transition to sleep, which means I don’t get to sleep at night. Or write. I made it 54 days.

You see, we just moved after having lived in a hotel for 84 nights while we waited for our new home to be completed. I was writing before bed every night most nights. That probably wasn’t the best strategy in that I either lost sleep or had limited writing time before going to bed. However, it worked while I was getting the habit started.

While I’m disappointed that I allowed my streak to be broken, I feel like I’ve established it pretty well as a habit. I just need to reschedule it into my day. I think it’s better to write at the beginning of the day and at lunch instead. It’s better to have the streak broken now than after 200, 500, 1000 days.

So, what did I accomplish in my 54 days of writing just a few minutes a day most days? Over 18,000 words. That’s a pretty good chunk of writing I likely wouldn’t have done otherwise. For those of you who care, that’s 335 words per day. It’s not a lot, but after a year of that pace, I’d have written over 120,000 words, which is the length of a relatively good-sized novel (~350 pages). I hope anyone who’s thinking about writing will consider that just a few minutes a day really is worth it and can add up to a significant amount of work over the medium term.

Ask any questions you have in the comments. Or ideas for future posts. Or random comments?