Choosing Your GYWO 2022 Pledge

[gywomod]

With GYWO 2022 Pledges opening next week, which pledge to choose is hopefully on your mind. Instead of letting everyone stew in their personal hells, we’re running down a few of the common things the mods tell panicked participants, and then offering the comments section as an opportunity for members and future members to talk to each other about their concerns and hopefully help each other come to a pledging decision!

If you're new to GYWO and have a question related to our membership requirements, general guidelines, monthly check-ins, or what words or activities count, please visit our website. More information about pledging for 2022 will be released the week of Dec 13.

Word Count Pledge Vs Habit Pledge
Deciding between a Word Count Pledge or Habit Pledge can be a difficult decision. Here are some things to consider as you make your choice:

• If you want to emphasize the habit of your writing life—encouraging you to sit down to write more often—a Habit Pledge is built to support that. With a Word Count Pledge, it’s easier to write in sustained sprints to reach your goal, but a Habit Pledge forces you to write more days than you might with a Word Count Pledge.
• If tracking your word count is stressful or confusing, try one of the Habit Pledges. You’ll only need to keep track of the number of days you write, instead of all those fiddly words.
• If you are planning to have a year that focuses on revising or on planning stories, a Habit Pledge might be right for you. The Habit Pledges allow you to count days you work on recorded creative writing activities beyond drafting or revising. Our website has more details about the Habit Pledges and further explains what writing activities count toward this pledge.
• You could, potentially, miss a Habit Pledge by running out of days in the year. The most challenging Habit Pledge allows missing up to 15 days, which doesn’t give much wiggle room for accomplishing the pledge later in the year. The Word Count Pledges offer more flexibility since you can catch up at (nearly) any time.
• If you’re already consistent (and happy) with your writing habit, choose a Word Count Pledge to continue to challenge yourself and grow your writing life.
• If you've completed a Word Count Pledge multiple times, but don't think you can hit the next highest Word Count Pledge, consider working on your writing habit this year with a Habit Pledge.
• While you must pick one pledge for GYWO, you can unofficially keep track of a secondary pledge. Your secondary pledge may give you information about choosing a pledge for a future year!

Habit Pledges
Choosing between Habit Pledges comes down to deciding how much you plan to write each month:

• If you plan to write mostly on weekends, choose the 120 Day Pledge. That’s weekends + 16 days.
• If you plan to write mostly on weekdays, choose the 240 Day Pledge. That’s weekdays – 20 days, giving you a few days off.
• If you want to write every day, choose the 350 Day Pledge!
• If you've participated previously and 120 Days was too easy, but 240 Days was too hard, try the new 180 Day Pledge to land right in between!
• If you haven’t tried writing daily before but want to, we recommend the 180 Day Pledge as a way to ease into a semi-daily writing habit before tackling a more challenging pledge.

Word Count Pledges
First Time with a Word Count Pledge?
If you’ve never tracked your word count for the year, take a moment to assess how many words you think you’ve written in the past year. Consider things like whether or not you participate in NaNoWriMo (50K), how much you’ve published in the last year (self or traditionally published, fanfic, blog, etc), and how much you tend to revise your work (writing it entirely over or just editing lines).

• If meeting your goal is more motivating, choose a goal that matches a conservative estimate of how much you wrote in 2021.
• If you think you’ll lose interest if you meet your goal early, choose a goal that matches a liberal estimate of how much you wrote in 2021.
• There are no penalties for not meeting your pledge, so don’t be afraid to choose a pledge you may not be able to meet!

If you’ve done GYWO before but aren’t certain which goal you want, you’ve likely narrowed it down to two goals. Here’s our advice for choosing between two word count goals…

Go Big on Word Counts

• If you wrote 50,000 words or more above your 2021 GYWO pledge level, choose the next pledge level up.* You've already "beaten" it once, so do it again officially.
• If having a big goal motivates you, choose the bigger goal you're between. There's no penalty for not meeting your goal, so if having the big carrot will push you to write, set yourself up with the most motivating goal.
• If you look ahead and see a lot of free time, a more relaxed year, or fewer obstacles between you and your writing time, choose the bigger goal you're between. Just keep an eye out for unexpected things that might take away that time!

*This advice is somewhat dubious if you are currently pledging 75K, 350K, or 500K

Step Back on Word Counts

• If you wrote 50,000 words below your 2021 GYWO pledge level, consider the next pledge level down if knowing that you will meet your pledge is more motivating to you.*
• If having a big goal intimidates you, choose the lesser goal you're between. It's great if you write above your pledge level, so if hitting your pledge early will keep you in a happy writing mood, set yourself up for success.
• If you look ahead and see a lot of non-writing projects, a major life change (moving house, changing jobs, getting married, having a child, etc), or another serious obstacle between you and your writing time, choose the lesser goal you're between. While life can be unpredictable (which we all know, thanks), there are some things we can predict, so there's no reason to stress out about your word count on top of your real life.

*This advice is somewhat dubious if you are currently pledging 75K, 150K, or 500K.

Keep Your Word Count Consistent

• If you're going to hit your 2021 GYWO pledge level within the month of December and it was a comfortable pace, keep it the same! The community goal is to keep you writing, so if your 2021 pledge level works for you, let it work for you in 2022.
• If you came close to hitting your 2021 pledge level or it was a challenge to make it, this might be the right pledge level to try again in 2022.

The best advice we have is to look at your schedule and figure out where writing fits into it. List out the projects, ficathons, and stories you might write next year and consider the word tallies or time involved. Really think about what's motivating for you—knowing you'll hit a goal or chasing down the finish line.

As a reminder, your GYWO pledge is locked in for the full year.
You cannot change pledges mid-year.
If you hit your goal early, you're still part of the same pledge group.
So choose a goal to sustain you ALL year.


In the comments, let us know your pledging woes! Wonder how difficult another pledge is? Still need clarity on the pledge types? This is your opportunity to ask. After some discussion, hopefully you'll come away with a confident decision.

Note: Commenting to this post does not constitute pledging for 2022. Come back next week and follow the instructions in the Pledges & Requirements post to make a pledge for 2022.

Comments

[theemdash]

I've been sort of torn on my 2022 pledge because while I'll hit 250K this year, it's a slog most of the year to get there. I think I've talked myself into it, though:

I've got a steady writing gig that should produce 80K words.
I'm planning to draft most of a novel, so roughly 100K words.
Regular blogging should account for about 30K words.
Which leaves me with 40K remaining, which isn't that much considering I also write posts for GYWO, fanfic, and various other things.

[vriddy]

"If you came close to hitting your 2021 pledge level or it was a challenge to make it, this might be the right pledge level to try again in 2022." is a very interesting point. I picked 250K in 2021 and will probably miss it by 30k words or so.

Right now I'm temped to go for 200k because there were lockdowns this year and I don't think I'll have the same amount of time to write early in the year in 2022, and I want to give myself the space to try new things which always means writing slower. Especially if I try to work on longer projects, which use up more of my stamina.

On the other hand it could be fun to aim for 250k words every year until I "finally meet it dammit" 😂 But realistically, if I look at my monthly totals since it's been possible to see people again, I haven't met the required monthly goal once, so... 200k is likely to be the more reasonable, actually achievable pledge for me.

Even if I utterly love the blue role on discord for the 250k pledge 💙😂

[theemdash]

I think it comes down to whether hitting the pledge would be more motivating. Would the pressure of being behind help you or stress you out? (Which can change year to year!)


On the mod side: MOST of the colors are changing next year to make space in the rainbow for the new pledges. (You can see the new colors on the front page of the website.) But, um, the 250K blue is staying. Which is wholly unrelated to any moderators in charge of approving designs also pledging 250K words. >.>

[racheloddment]

I'm very excited about the new 180 day pledge! I'll be at about 160 days this year, so 180 is perfect to push myself a little bit further. Maybe eventually I'll make it up to 240 😂

[thissugarcane]

It's probably not a popular take, but I hit my pledge in the spring, and consistently being "ahead" was more motivating than previous years where I fell behind or just kept up. So the satisfaction of being over one's goal can be a decent motivator too.

Thinking out loud

[annofowlshire]

Returning to GYWO after a year off (although I’ve changed my username again, LOL). Have new pledges been added? Or was that in 2021?

Anyway, much to my surprise for a year I was planning to “take off from writing,” I’ve started working in narrative for gamedev as my FT job. Scripts tend to be less word count heavy (but challenging in their own way), and looking at my monthly output this year, I’d guestimate I was ranging approx 7k words a month of polished, implementable scripts (and maybe up to 12k a month if one takes into account that I also write client-facing location, character, casting call, storyline overview, FMV scripts, and a variety of other narrative documents.)

So let’s call that 100k as an average for this year. EXCEPT that we recently did a team expansion, and I went from one woman doing All Things Narrative to leading a team of 3 (including me). I’m still writing a lot, but I’m not the only one (and I’m doing a lot of non-writing but still narrative-related tasks) and I’m not yet sure how that impacts me on a raw word count level.

Arg. Anyway. I feel that 75k isn’t a challenge given that just doing my job would theoretically account for that. 150k feels like it might be much, although that goes into the OTHER stuff I want to be doing this year.

2021 was really getting acquainted with this new medium and I wasn’t able to seriously delve into side projects because I’m fairly monogamous about my projects and I was tackling a lot of new skills and inputs as well. However, someday this project/contract will end and I’ve found I like doing this and so I want to write some interactive fiction samples to use as portfolio pieces for when that time comes and I’m shopping for a new studio client. Is that another 75k worth to get me to 150k? I’m not sure, but I’m nothing if not ambitious?

It all feels very light when I was usually doing the 350k pledge in the past, but that was novels. And although I don’t feel scripts are any less difficult, when you crunch the raw word count they don’t feel nearly as impressive.

tl;dr I’ll probably do 150k, but I’m having inadequate feelings about it and I’d be happy to have feedback and/or support. The habit pledges won’t work for me because 240 days is literally just showing up for my job and 350 days is unrealistic for my life.

[theemdash]

I had that same experience one year when I unexpectedly made my goal in the summer! So, yes, sometimes hitting early is more motivating.

HOWEVER, as a mod, I would love to encourage people consistently hitting in Spring to aim for completing their goal over the Summer. Still early, and you'll still be ahead all that time, but it's a better match to what you're actually producing.

[muscle_wizard]

I've been thinking a lot about which pledge to go with next year! I took the same pledge (Habit 240) the last two years and tbh I'm glad I did because it really gave me a sense of relief with my situation this year.

Last year I went over and wrote 300 days, crushing it and making me feel elated that the discipline I was working on had paid off with the support and encouragement from the community. This year I will not be meeting my pledge and tbh, that was a conscious decision on my part because of shifting focus on my health and preparing for a busy spring coming my way. In October I asked if not meeting my pledge would feel like a failure and I said, "No." After a break, I went back to writing and finished up all my other writing obligations -- leaving only my projects in my lap. Taking my time with them has been enjoyable, and I'll be happy with whatever number I end up with because I'm doing my best.

All that said, switching focus to a Word Count goal will help me out a lot with the crazy start to next year! I'm eying anywhere between 200k - 300k because that's where I've been on average the last few years. Still attempting to practice the ever tricky "just write don't edit" mentality lol but I have hope.

[annofowlshire]

To repeat your own advice back to you—will you be more motivated by the push or more motivated to complete and then carry on?

[annofowlshire]

I love the habit pledges in theory, but have found word count pledges more motivating toward my goals.

Do you have a sense of what kind of projects and their associated (estimated) word counts you want to work on next year? That’s always helped me figure out my goal.

[sheenianni]

I'm torn between the 75k word pledge and the 120 day pledge... This will be my fourth or fifth year of doing GYWO and I've never succeeded with either (though the past two years probably shouldn't count as I almost completely put my writing on a back-burner).

I think I'll try the word pledge again - it's about 6,300 words per month, which is 1-3 chapters/short stories. It seems more doable than ten writing days a month - I can always hope to make up for "not enough progress" with a writing burst (if only).

[theemdash]

At this point I think 200K is just waaaaay too easy with my writing life, responsibilities, and plans for 2022. (If I wasn't drafting a novel, I might be more tempted by the 200K.)

[vriddy]

Haha, totally fair decision on the colours 😂

I think falling very far behind would be discouraging and I'm not confident I can keep up the same pace next year, so I will probably aim for 200K (goodbye, lovely blue!). If I meet that pledge, I'll have more information to reevaluate for GYWO 2023! Very excited.

[theemdash]

Sooooo.... I never "just write, don't edit." I personally don't find it helpful because it's not my natural mode. If the editing gets in the way of progress, yeah, that's a problem. But if it's just part of your writing process and you can still finish projects, that may be a mentality you don't need. (Not every writing process looks the same, and you should figure out what works best for you.)

If you're between 200K and 300K, I suppose the easy solution is to pick 250K? Unless that feels like it might be too much given the obligations you already know about in the spring.

[badly_knitted]

I'm torn. I know I can manage 200k easily, but I also know that's committing to 548 words a day at the start of the year (it goes down as time passes) and I don't want to feel constrained when I';d also like to do more crafting, so I'm dithering between sticking to 200k or dropping to 150k. I hate making decisions, someone tell me what to do!

[annofowlshire]

It’s legit of you to decide that you want to spend more of next year focused on another hobby. In that case, I would choose the lower goal unless 200k was “easy” in the way that you shoot past it so far normally that you could still achieve without compromising on your desire to spend more time crafting (and making yourself miserable trying to do both at full tilt).

[theemdash]

I'm in a very similar boat at 250K. I know I can reach the goal, but at the start of the year it's very intimidating, partly because of how BUSY I am.

What I did last year was decide that if I was within 4% of my goal (that's behind up to 10,000 words for the 250K total), then I would be fine. Because I was sure I could catch up 10,000 words between Nov and Dec if I had to.

So, is there a number you know you could catch up later if you fall behind early in the year? Can you set your tracker to aim for that number and give yourself a slightly easier goal during those busiest months? If not—or if you know it would be too stressful—150K is your plan!

[newsbypostcard]

Last year I aimed for 500k and hit 407k, this year I aimed for 500k and will probably hit 450k, next year I'll aim for 500k and... hopefully hit it? The trend is in the right direction. But honestly just the goal itself is motivating. I'm always happy if I break 400k anyway!

[muscle_wizard]

Yeah, tbh reading your comment has made me realize I chose my words poorly. It's less the "do less editing in between" part and more "feeling free," while writing I want to keep nourishing? I want to practice letting my words spill out a little bit more c: So I think the WC will be encouraging for me in that way!

Hmmm, yeah, I'm still considering it. I'll let it marinate in my brain over the weekend and see what pops out, ready to go into the oven <3

[muscle_wizard]

I needed the habit pledge last year, and it was good, but yeah. Definitely think the word count pledge will be good for both my schedule and my goals too c:

I wrote some practice fan games this year (for renpy and twine) to hype myself up for attempting my first original fangame script next year! So that'll be a large part of my words, especially since I'm still developing the idea I want to do.

Otherwise I plan on writing more fanfiction. I'll be joining some events, minibangs, and want to work on a pdf drabble collection I had to put on the backburner this year.

[annofowlshire]

Ah! Another game writer! Learning Twine (or Inform or Ren’py) or similar is one of my goals for next year.

[muscle_wizard]

Oooh! It's a lot of fun, I really enjoy it *A* I'm still getting familiar with the more complicated loops and settings, myself. I've been making little games in Renpy for a few years, so the coding is more familiar to me.

I saw in your comment about your devjob, in the future I'd love to talk to you about it c: Do you happen to be on Discord?

[badly_knitted]

I hit 200k this year halfway through July, but I keep feeling I want to ease back on the writing a bit, focus more on knitting and cross stitch. I just have a really hard time deciding anything. I'm a ditherer and a procrastinator though, and if I cut back writing to do more crafting, will I just end up frittering the time away on other things?

*pokes brain* Why can't you be like other brains?

[badly_knitted]

I don't actually use a tracker, just notes in my diary. I'm low-tech *grins*

I usually do the bulk of my writing early in the year, while it's too cold to be out in the garden, but I could be doing more crafting in the first few months instead, I have so much in my crafting stash I want to use up and so many things I'd like to make... If I went with the lower goal, I'd be committing (I think) to under 500 wpd to start with, so maybe I could hit that faster and spend more time knitting or whatever... Maybe I should think about it a bit more.

*wanders away cogitating*

[annofowlshire]

Yes, of course! I believe I am Ann of Owlshire#8653. I may want to pick your brain on story engines, too ^_^ We use an internal system so I haven’t had a chance to learn them “on the job.”