The 52-Week Writing Challenge

Pick a thing (anything!) Commit to it.

The Challenge

2017 is fast approaching and the beginning of the new year is obviously a ripe time to set goals and resolutions. The Writing Cooperative would like to challenge you to commit to writing on a weekly basis and to offer the support of a community of fellow writers committing to do the same.

Sounds easy, right?

Well, it can be!

The only rule is this: you commit to writing a thing (anything!) each week.

You can define what that thing is. Everyone has different things they’re working on, different genres, different format preferences — so pick what appeals to you and challenge yourself to do it 52 times in 2017.

Still confused? Here are some ideas you might consider:

• Write one poem, in any format, per week
• Write one haiku per week
• Write a movie review every week
• Write about your favorite meal every week
• Write a book chapter every week
• Write a character sketch every week
• Write a 100-word love story every week
• Write a 50-word horror story every week
• Recount stories about your daughter every week
• Every week, write about a different emotion
• Tell us your “week in review” in 500 words or less
• Write a story made up only of emoji every week
• Tell a story in comic-form every week
• Write a story about your cat each week
• And so forth…

The possibilities are endless, and the choice is yours! The real challenge is in making the commitment to write this thing for 52 weeks.

Set Yourself Up For Success

How often have you made a New Year’s Resolution and completely abandoned it by February? Maybe March?

Or, maybe you’ve made resolutions in the past and been successful in maintaining them? What makes the difference between success and failure when it comes to these resolutions? Let’s see…

• Setting well-defined AND reasonable goals. “I will write every week” is reasonable, but not well-defined. “I will start and finish writing a 500-page novel every month” is well-defined, but pretty unreasonable. Think small, discrete, baby steps, like those above.
• Lack of accountability. It’s easy to be lax in working toward your goals when you have no one to report to but yourself. But, when you have a team or group holding you accountable for your actions, or lack thereof, you’re probably more likely to come through. Now, the Writing Cooperative is not going to punish you for failing on certain weeks, but we encourage you to participate as part of this team effort. At the end of the year, you’ll have amassed a portfolio of writing, along with all the other participants, and The Writing Cooperative will feature the completed projects come January 2018.
• Lack of support. If you’re working toward a goal and going at it solo, again, it’s pretty easy to give up. When you have a buddy you can lean on for encouragement, things suddenly feel much easier. If you’re hitting a block, ping on a Coop editor to toss some ideas around. If you have a stressful week and can’t find time to write, hit us up! Just having someone to vent to may help set you back on track. You can always tweet us @WritingCoop or email contact@writingcooperative.com!

How To Participate

Step 1 is: choose your thing! Think about what you want to commit to writing for 52-weeks and tell us your goal as a response to this post! This can be as brief or as long as you’d like. This counts as week one! Have it posted by January 7th so you can be off and running for week 2.

(Side note: If you’re joining us late, feel free to hop in at any time. Commit to your thing and go! The more, the merrier.)

Steps 2–52: write the things! Every week, write whatever it is you committed to producing. Publish it here on Medium, in whichever publication is appropriate for the content (or in no publication at all). Be sure to tag it with “52 Week Writing Challenge” using Medium’s tag feature so it’s easy to find all the stories from participating writers. Share your challenge material on Twitter and tag @WritingCoop or #coop52 so we can help share your stories, too!

Various steps in between: check-in! We’ll periodically ask for check-ins from participants, whether on Medium or some other forum, to share updates on your progress. Is it going well? Are you struggling? Did you hate the topic you picked so you switched to a different one? Tell us. Tell other writers. Hold one another accountable.

We hope you’ll join us in committing to write! Here’s to a productive 2017!

— The Writing Cooperative editors, Jessica Jungton, Sand Farnia 👽, Justin Cox 🌮, and Stella J.