Should you write a certain amount of books a year?

 

Absolutely not. I tried that last year in my first professional writing year and it just stressed me out. I was writing books and feeling like I was so far behind everybody else, as if it was a competition. I kept trying to force myself to write each book in 6 weeks or less and now that I think about it, a deadline like that doesn't make any sense. Google was telling me that I should write 6 books a year and then it said don't write more than 4 books a year, a couple articles told me to focus on one or two books a year. Every day I was trying to follow someone else's plan for writing, when the books were my own. Like I said, it was very stressful. Whenever I didn't meet that ridiculous deadline I set, I'd feel this massive wave of failure and eventually tried to rush the book out. Which obviously takes from the quality of any book. After failing a few more times while trying to live up to my own terrible standards, I came to the realisation that quantity means nothing when every book isn't worth reading past page 65. I stopped writing completely for about two months and spent my time figuring out what my proper next steps needed to be. After spending time away from writing and regrouping, I began to find my footing. I still wanted to work with deadlines just to make sure that I was being productive, but I chose deadlines that gave more flexibility. I tasked myself to finish a chapter a month and with that much time available I actually finished two chapters a month. Which led to me to decide that I'd dedicate three months to each book, so that I didn't feel rushed to finish anything. My system works for me and allows me to work on a project without feeling immense amounts of pressure. I can focus on the quality of a book and still manage quantity at the same time. It's also helpful to task yourself with writing 500 words a day or 5000 words a week, whatever fits you and your schedule. I'm sure you already knew that it wasn't a good idea to try and pump out book after book, it is very obviously a bad idea. Still I wanted to share my trial and error pertaining to how many books you should write a year. The number should come from you and fit your work ethic. Don't feel like you absolutely have to write 3 to 6 books a year. Some people can do ten books a year, other people dedicate a year to one book and both options are fine if it's your choice. Setting unreasonable deadlines takes away from your work and will affect your growth as a writer. Thank you for reading this post, it's yet another one of my rambles that I just had to get out. I do hope that I gave you something from this post and made your writing journey a tad bit easier.