when i first started grad school, i prided myself at being good at writing. i could pay attention in class all semester long, do the reading, go to lecture….and then write the term paper one (maybe two) days before - if not the night before! - it was due. i got good grades, i had lots of extra time to play around, A+ system.
so when it dawned on me that i had to work on my writing over time and NOT overnight, i had a lot of hesitation because how do you know what’s enough? how do you measure a daily writing session when do you stop for the day if the only concrete stopping point is “it’s done”?
i find that there are, essentially, two ways to measure your writing - word count/content progression, or time spent. and, like so many other things in academia, the one that will work best for you is context dependent, and will probably change over time. so i’m going to list out the pros and cons for each system, so that you can match it up to where you are right now, and return to it if (when) it changes in the future.
word count/content milestones
this is a way of measuring writing that is very concrete - you count the number of words you added to a document (or number of paragraphs, or which section you added) over the course of the writing session.
this is really good for:
times when you want something concrete and measureable
heavy drafting seasons, where you’re writing a lot of new content
when numbers really motivate you
when you want the flexibility of being able to stop whenever you hit your content/word count goal
it can be less useful if:
you don’t have a clear idea of what you’re drafting, and there’s actually a lot of prep work needed in order to get those words written
you can get easily demotivated by days where the writing doesn’t flow, but you still moved forward
you have a tendency to write to the word count without necessarily focusing on how well aligned that writing is with the draft (aka, 5 or 6 days in a row of freewriting on a less-central thread of your writing and not checking back to check if that’s going to fit into this draft)
time milestones - poms or hours per day
this looks like “25 minutes of dissertation a day” or “10 hours over the course of the week” - you can schedule it in or just let it add up as you measure it.
this is really good for:
a schedule that is really full - the time can keep you connected, and be scheduled in advance, or included as part of your routine to make sure you keep moving it forward
research, revision, or restructuring phases of your writing where you’re making good progress that isn’t well measured by word count
when the project is a little scary, and you want some task flexibility to help you find things that feel possible
it can be less useful if:
you need a little more incentive to move into a heavy drafting phase, and the time framework makes it easy to stay in research
if you can easily focus on areas of the writing process that you really like, and have trouble switching into other gears
i find that for most people, a combination works well! give yourself credit for the time, and check in with a content milestone regularly. but knowing when to stop is really important to a sustainable writing practice - and having some measurement schema will help you integrate it into the workflow of everything else you’re asked to do.