Three-Year Wordcount Graph Analysis

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Contrast
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Three-Year Wordcount Graph Analysis

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Post by Contrast »

Hey, guys! It’s that time of the year again! Time for Contrast’s Epic Annual Wordcount Graph!! Commence the cheering! Yaaa- Actually, no, don’t, because 2017 freaking SUUUUUUCKED!! >.<

First of all, my laptop exploded early this year and I lost all the data for 2017 up until that point. All I remembered was that my average was about 700, and that’s why the first part of the graph is just a straight line.

Oh, the humanity. Not that the rest of the graph is much better. Without a doubt the worst year for productivity I’ve had since my first tentative year of serious writing.

What went wrong, you ask? I’m not entirely sure, but I do have some theories, and I think all of them contributed to the grinding slog 2017 eventually turned out to be. So, without further ado, let’s get to analysin’! I know, I know, the unbridled excitement might too much for the more sensitive individuals to bear, but I’ll try to be as succinct and organised as possible. ;)

2015
Total: 350 211
Average: 959,48 / day
Highest: 1946
2015
2015

2016
Total: 367 082
Average: 1002,96 / day
Highest: 1731
2016
2016

2017
Total: 260 641
Average: 714,08 / day
Highest: 2303
2017
2017

Theory 1: Good ol’ Overworking

Going just by the data alone, we see an interesting pattern (interesting to me, at least). In 2015 and 2016, I had a schedule of writing 800 words in the morning and 800 words in the afternoon for a total of 1600 per day. This was pretty consistent, and I managed to maintain a fairly high average.

Then 2017 came along and I tried to increase my productivity by changing my schedule. For the entire year, I tried to write 700 words in the morning, 700 words in the afternoon, and then another 700 words at night. Theoretically this should have increased my output by 500 words per day, but as you can see, that clearly didn’t happen.

But why? If I increased my time spent writing by a whopping 50% (and I really, really did spend way more time on those sessions than normal, even though the goal per session was slightly less than previous years) then why did my output drop by approximately 30%?

I think I may have overworked myself. Nothing so dramatic as a sudden burn-out resulting in an instant drop of the graph, but you can clearly see my struggle in every jag of the blue line. On the good days I was able to pump out those 2100 words, yes, but those days were way less consistent, and ultimately resulted in a substantial drop in total words written.

Here’s some food for thought. In 2016 the most I ever managed was 1731 words in a single day. In 2017 the days I pumped out 2000+ words were much more frequent, even going as high as 2303. But when you compare the totals at the end of the year, 2016 gave me 367 082, whereas 2017 ended at 260 641.

My dudes. That’s a difference of 106 441 words. I wrote 106 441 less words, even though I spent 50% more time working. I find this almost as fascinating as it is vexing, and I’m actually interested in hearing if anyone else has had experience with this kind of thing in other lines of work, where increasing work time has resulted in a loss of productivity. Feel free to share.

Theory 2: Reaction Time

This is going to sound convoluted as hell, but this entire thing is pretty convoluted already, so what the hay, let’s dive right in.

Writing speed is kinda like driving speed. The faster you go, the less time you have to react. Put simply, if you put-put-put along at 50km/h in your VW Bug, you’ll be able to see all the potholes coming well beforehand and swerve accordingly. Conversely, if you speed along the highway in your stepmom’s Ferrari at 200km/h, you’re going to plough straight through every pothole and ostrich in your path, which will, more likely than not, result in you getting stuck on the side of the road in a perpetual loop of making repairs and scraping bloody feathers off your grill before speeding off again, only to plough into even more potholes and ornery ostriches down the road.

Wow, that was even more convoluted than I thought. Let’s try again, but with actual writing as an example.

Let’s say I want to write a short story about Bob and his magical pet ostrich. Let’s say this short story will be twenty thousand words long. If I write 1000 words a day, I’ll be done in twenty days. So, logically, if I speed along at 2000 words a day, I’ll be done in ten days, right?

WROOOOONG!! Get out of my house and take your logic with you! >:[

Here’s the thing. Going slow gives the story time to percolate in the back of your head without you even knowing. It happens automatically. Your brain follows the possible roads the story can take and filters out the bad ones while you’re taking a shower or playing a game or screaming at the TV. So, when you sit back down to write the next installment of Bob’s adventure, you have a higher chance of writing something that will end up in a satisfactory place.

But what if you speed along, like I tried to do this year? Your brain doesn’t have enough time to filter out the bad roads as you progress, and this means you’ll end up at a lot of dead ends, which wastes a lot of time. Waaaay more time than you might realize. If you get a chapter right the first time, that’s great. You read through it one last time, fix a spelling error here and there, and you’re done. But if you mess up the chapter, oh boy…

Here’s what my year was like.

Finish a chapter. Read through it. It sucks. Proofread it (which is like normal reading, but you frown a lot more). Try to find where you went wrong. Re-write the chapter. Read through it again. It still sucks because now the rewrite made a whole bunch of new problems. Re-proofread it (which is like proofreading, except with a pounding headache and a sense of encroaching doom). Re-rewrite it. Repeat the whole process until you eventually wind up with a version that doesn’t make you want to stick your face in a ceiling fan.

So yeah. That’s what 2017 was like for me. Basically a whole lot of reversing in my stepmom’s Ferrari, dragging ostrich entrails down the road.

Theory 3: Six GODDAMN Years

This one is pretty self-explanatory. I’ve been working on Ander for nearly six GODDAMN years. Don’t get me wrong, I love Ander, I think it’s the best thing I’ve ever written, but after working on the same GODDAMN thing for six GODDAMN years, I think anyone might slow down a little. :[

Conclusion

I could go on. I could talk about the endless cycle of perfectionism. I could talk about the self-fulfilling prophesies of self-doubt. I could talk about the adverse effects of trying to write with ostrich blood gumming up the keyboard (the secret is vinegar and a soft sponge). But I fear I might just end up repeating myself, because ultimately it will always boil down to: “This isn’t good enough. I must start over. Progress will have to wait.”

2017 was a total bitch, but I think it taught me more about the actual labour aspects of writing than all the previous years combined, and I’m hoping I’ll be able to enter 2018 with a better mindset and use the experience I’ve gained throughout this shitshow of a year to better avoid the pitfalls and setbacks I have now become so intimately familiar with.

Until next year, my dudes, this is Contrast - Signing off.





Well, I’m not actually going anywhere, but you don’t have to read this thing anymore. :P
Read my novel on: SoFurry | Fur Affinity | Deviant Art
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