In the wake of recent tragedies, there are good things happening and ways we all can help; anything from making a donation to the Red Cross or Doctors Without Borders or, coming from our community, entering the auction for kidlit4japan, but I want to invite you to do something positive and meaningful on a much smaller, more selfish scale: something for me and something for you, because collectively, we can do anything.
I may have mentioned only about a bazillion times that my second degree black belt test is this weekend. I have been training for this, on and off, for the past ten years. Ten years. The last four months have been a grueling regimen of strict diet, physical and scheduling challenges, and increasing my workouts from four hours a week to four hours a day...just in time for me to get hit with a double-whammy of both the flu and pneumonia.
I have been resting, taking fluids, and imbibing a whole host of meds. Unfortunately, as of this date, it's a slow recovery and I'm nowhere near healthy. The test will likely not be rescheduled and I can't make my body heal any faster, so it comes down to this: am I going to try my best? The answer: "Damn straight!" but I don't think I can do this alone.
Since I obviously won't be able to write my usual daily word count during my testing time (roughly 5pm on Friday "til whenever" and picking up again on Saturday from 3pm "til whenever"), I am challenging *YOU* to write in my stead, going beyond your usual limits, on your own projects. The challenge is to DOUBLE YOUR NORMAL DAILY WORD COUNT during one Butt In Chair writing session at the keys sometime between this Saturday, March 19th, and next Saturday, March 26th. Post your amazing total on Twitter with the hashtag #blackbeltwriter and I will randomly pick one person to win a handmade-by-me, one-of-a-kind, especially-for-this-contest-thingie
Writer Ninja is cloaked in a black cotton gi wielding a deadly #2 pencil and a patented Red Pen O'Doom™!
(P.S. Sorry the camera was out of batteries so this is the best I could do via Droid.)
It's about busting through walls.
It's about going for broke.
It's about pushing beyond limits.
It's about cheering one another on.
It's...
The Slapped-Together Rules for Dawn's Insanely Crazy Double-Your-Word-Count Black Belt Writer Challenge:
1) Sit down sometime between Saturday the 19th and Saturday the 26th and write twice as much as you normally do.
[If you'd like double *my* word count, I wrote 2-3K per day = 4-6K!] This is going to be on the honor system, so I trust that you rock!
2) Brag about your total word count on Twitter with the hashtag #blackbeltwriter
3) Remember to cheer one another on: Black Belt Writers FTW!
4) If you return and comment on this post, we can cheer for one another in the thread and see who joined in the insanity, which would be incredibly comforting during my recovery period.
5) On Monday the 27th, presuming that my brain is fully functional, I will choose a winner at random and announce it on the blog.
Yes, this is scary, and senseless, and almost certifiably insane, but I think I know just the right people to join me in spirit during this do-or-die event and I want you to feel the rush of busting through your own glass ceilings and doing what you previously thought was impossible! And in the spirit of NaNoWriMo-meets-Nidan training, a community of supporters can carry us further than we ever thought possible.
You can do this. I can do this. We can do this. So who's with me?
