avatarAlex Philippe

Summary

Alex Philippe reflects on his progress after 10 days into a 100-day writing challenge, sharing his strategies, emotional experiences, and statistics.

Abstract

Alex Philippe has embarked on a 100-day writing challenge, successfully publishing 10 stories within the first 10 days. He has made strategic adjustments, such as not publishing on weekends due to low traffic and submitting to larger publications for greater visibility. Despite the challenge of writing in English as a non-native speaker and balancing a full-time job, Philippe finds moments of bliss in his writing flow. His statistics show variable viewership, with a modest following of 25 on Medium. Philippe's strategy includes developing a consistent writing habit, engaging with writing communities, finding inspiration through reading and nature walks, and ensuring article quality through editing and writing exercises. He acknowledges the importance of self-care to prevent burnout and is pleased with his progress, having implemented most of the habits he planned.

Opinions

  • Philippe finds the writing pace daunting but is pleased with the quality of his work.
  • He believes in the value of feedback from experienced writers and the potential of his posts.
  • Philippe is strategic about publication selection, aiming for larger audiences by submitting to publications like "Start it up" and "The Writing Cooperative."
  • He is cautious about growing his follower count organically, preferring genuine interest over aggressive calls to action.
  • Philippe uses tools like Grammarly, a dedicated Chrome profile, and a spreadsheet to track his articles, demonstrating a streamlined writing process.
  • He prioritizes mental and physical health by incorporating meditation, exercise, and recovery days into his routine.
  • Philippe is disciplined in his writing and editing process, adhering to a rule of never publishing an article the same day it's written.
  • He follows specific writing rules to ensure his articles have a deep impact on readers.
  • Philippe is optimistic about the journey ahead and is committed to maintaining his progress throughout the challenge.

WRITING

100 Days of Writing: Day 10 — Am I in Hell Or Heaven?

My impressions after 10 days of writing

Photo by Thomas Franke on Unsplash

On 1st February 2022, I started a 100 days writing challenge, where I aimed to post one story per day on Medium. Today is day 10, and it’s time for a check-in.

In this post, you’ll discover how I’m progressing on this challenge, I’ll share my feelings and my strategy.

I hope it inspires you to write.

I’m on track

Let’s cover the most important point first: my progress. Well I’m doing fine! To date, I have written 10 stories in 10 days if I include this one. But I had to make several adjustments:

  • First, I decided not to publish on the week-end, as it is not worth it: the traffic is too low.
  • Secondly, two of the posts I wrote are not published yet. This is because I’m trying to get into big publications, and it requires some time to get approved.

Right now I’ve submitted to Start it up (753K followers) and I plan to submit the other one to The Writing Cooperative (236K followers).

I don’t rush things. I want to make sure my posts have potential before submitting them to the big guys. So I try to ask feedback from experienced writers, which adds more delay. But I’m convinced this is absolutely worth it!

Another of my goals was to develop my ideas on average length stories. On this front, I think I’m doing great as those 10 articles are all above 500 words.

It’s a hell of a journey!

Now on the emotional level, I have to say I find it daunting to sustain this pace. I told you already I’m a native French speaker and the words don’t come easily. I spend countless hours on it: around 4 hours per story right now, in addition to my full-time job. So I can say this is a hell of a journey!

On the other hand, I’m pleased with what I produce right now. Well, at least I can bear it when I read myself again (I told you I’m a perfectionist). Some morning, it is pure bliss. I can feel I’m in the flow and that I make significant contributions. This makes me so happy. I think this is what makes me continue this adventure!

My Statistics

Now let’s see my statistics.

First the story stats:

Screenshot by Alex Philippe

As you can see, my views are irregular right now. Some days, the planets are aligned and the story I post does great. Other times I get just a handful of views.

Right now I’m mainly publishing on ILLUMINATION, which is excellent to begin with. But when you publish in ILLUMINATION, your posts are often lost among a sea of other publications, so you can’t expect to have a big audience from there. I’ll see what happens if I get accepted to bigger and more selective publications.

Now let’s see the audience stats:

Screenshot by Alex Philippe

As you can see, I have 25 followers right now. So my results are pretty modest.

But I haven’t done much to grow my follower count. For example I don’t make calls to action and I don’t post that many comments in fellow writers’ stories.

Maybe that’s something I need to work on. But I also like when people follow me because they are genuinely interested in reading my next posts.

My secret sauce

Last but not least, let’s see my strategy. What’s my secret sauce?

Well, it’s not that secret as I already revealed how I planned to make this challenge successful in the post announcing this challenge.

I included a big list of habits I planned to develop.

Let’s see if I implemented them, and what I learned along the way:

Developing consistency and motivation

  • I will develop a habit of writing for one hour each morning when I wake up. This one is crucial and I did it. But I realized I need way more than 1 hour to advance on my articles property. I also write during evenings.
  • I will do calls with my accountability partner to help me stay focused on my goals. For this one, I tried to get a new accountability partner, but I’m still meeting different people to find a suitable person. Ideally, this would be someone that writes each day like me.
  • I will actively participate in various writers’ communities — currently, I’m part of the Write Useful Books and ILLUMINATION slack workspaces. Yes I did that one too, and it has been very helpful.
  • Other than that, I’ve streamlined my writing process a bit. Right now, I’m using a nice outlining tool to write my posts faster. I use a dedicated Chrome profile where I can find all my writing bookmarks. And I also started using a spreadsheet to keep track of my articles, as advised by fellow writer AP Carpen.

Finding inspiration

  • I will read medium articles and follow interesting writers that I enjoy. Yes, I did that too. I use the Medium app to read posts on my mobile. But I have to be careful not to use it during my main work because it can consume a lot of time!
  • I will read a book each day for at least 30 minutes. Yes, I’m doing this almost every day. The book I’m reading right now is Contagious.
  • I will do daily walks in nature. Yes, I typically do this every day. Many times, I used my headset to listen to audio books while I walk. But I’ve also started to use these walks to generate content.
  • Other than that, I like to use Obsidian for note-taking. This helps me to find inspiration as my ideas are all inter-connected via bi-directional links. This is also where my personal journal resides.

Avoiding burnout

  • I will do meditation or take a nap each morning after publishing my daily article. I don’t always do it just after I publish my daily article. But I try to do relaxing activities every day. Thank god I’m working from home! I think I could not do this challenge if I was working in a stressful open-space office.
  • I will do vigorous exercise during my walks in nature. Yes, I’m doing that too! I also take cold showers regularly.
  • I will write articles in advance. This point is very important. But I’m not so successful with that. Right now, I have only 1 article in advance. It’s better than 0 but it’s not enough. I will need to work on it this weekend, so that I don’t always write in urgent mode.
  • Other than that, I try to have one recovery day per week, typically on Saturday, where I don’t work much and focus on relaxing activities. Right now, I don’t feel so much stressed out. So I have to keep it that way.

Ensuring I write quality articles

  • I will never publish an article the same day I wrote the first draft so that I can edit it properly. I was very disciplined with this(except for the present post) and it’s been a blessing! It is much easier to notice logical errors when you have slept on your draft.
  • I will use Grammarly to spot my grammar mistakes. Yes! This is a crucial tool for my writing. But some Grammarly advices are not that great, so I often adjust the writing to my style.
  • I will practice writing exercises, such as studying my favorite authors and reusing their writing plans. I didn’t do much writing exercises. It’s probably something I have to work on. However, I tried to raise my awareness of the writing techniques used in the stories I read. Maybe at some point I will find some authors that I really want to emulate.
  • Other than that, I try to follow 3 simple writing rules to make my articles impactful: focusing on the reader, providing evidence on my points, and writing catchy titles.

Wow, this was a long list!

Do you remember in the post announcing the challenge that I said: “But if I can do at least 50% of this plan, I will be pleased.” ?

Well I can be pleased as I managed to implement almost all the habits included in my plan. This feels so great!

The 9 posts I wrote since the beginning

Lastly, here’s the list of stories I wrote since the start of this challenge in case you’ve missed them:

1. My War of Art: 100 Days of Writing 2. A Brief History of Productivity Methods — Part 1: The Goal-Setting Trend 3. Why I Created an Embarrassingly *Messy* Blog 4. Why I Don’t Make my Bed 5. My Weapon of Mass Time Saving 6. Unstoppable Writing: 3 Easy Hacks to Unleash Your Creative Writing Flow (pending publication) 7. How to Avoid Getting Sucked into YouTube Recommended Videos 8. 12 Fascinating Facts About Jack Ma and the Rise Of Alibaba (pending publication) 9. 3 Must-Have Rules to Write Deep Impact Articles

I hope this piece has inspired you. I’ll try to post check-ins every now and then. This first check-in was critical as it helped to establish a baseline for my performance. The next check-ins will be interesting, as they will show what kind of results this creative process can lead to.

In 1st february 2022, I’ve embarked in a 100 days writing challenge. This is post number 10.

Writing
Discipline
Productivity
Business
Habits
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