The Million Word Journey

Introduction

05.29.2020

 I, Damian Pak, pledge to write one million words.

If I'm being frank, between all the projects on my Wattpad, the unpublished ones, the abandoned ones, and the one vampire story I finished a couple years ago that I really like that uh, none of you will remember, I'm probably already hit the six hundred, seven hundred thousand mark. But nah.

Recently I got a hold of this browser game called "4thewords." Or well, I got it in 2016 but It costs four dollars a month and I was too broke to play it until now. Ladies, gents, enbies, it's so worth it. You battle monsters by completing timed writing challenges, and through that, you gain xp, get crafting material, and explore. It's awesome, because a lot of browser games exploit psychological tricks to make you play and give the developers money. 4thewords turns around and uses those psychological trappings for good. Loot boxes are free and earned through completing quests, and quests are completed through writing.

And better yet, the game keeps a track of how much you've written, how much time you've spent writing, how many monsters you've battled, areas you've unlocked, challenges won, and days in a row spent doing said writing. Looking at the word counter on my bio gave me an idea, a kind of big, kind of bad idea, but an idea nonetheless.

I want that word counter to read 'One Million.'

There's this theory among writers, that one doesn't become "good" at writing until they've either a) written for ten years or b) written one million words. I think about this sometimes, when I'm reading something I've just written and it sounds like absolute horse shit. I crack a smile, try to laugh, and say to myself something like, 'Well, at least I'll be good at writing when I'm twenty-four.' Which both makes me feel better and worse at the same time.

Now, it may sound like I'm just terrified of rejection and making excuses to not try getting my work published. I might be, and you're probably right. You also might be wondering if this project, 'The Million Word Journey,' counts toward those million words. And the answer to that is yes. You then might wonder if this whole journal was just a way to pad my word count when I get too lazy to try to write well or creatively.

To which I say: uhh....pfft, what me, procrastinate writing my other stories, what, no?

So here's how this is going to work: I'm going to break down this journal into sections, each section titled after where I am in the journey (Pt.1: < 100K, Pt.2: 200k—300k, Pt.3:300k—400k, etc).

 In these sections, I'm going to detail what music I'm listening to, what projects I'm working on, what writing techniques I'm planning to practice, formulas I use, motivation tactics, and uh...whatever dumb shit goes through my head. I assume I'll be squeezing thoughts here that I don't know where else to fit. Mostly yelling at myself, I think, or writing about all the strange things I've found, like The Pepsi Papers, or Dolls Kill Merch or the Small Town Titans cover of You're a Mean One Mr. Grinch (whyyesthistheonlychristmasmusiciwilllistento).

Yup. 

Grab your sword, you're coming with me.