4 Key Lessons From My 30-Day Writing Challenge That Every Aspiring Writer Should Know

Here's why everyone is talking about writing challenges—and how they can transform your skills!

2 min read
introspection writing

Today is the last day of my first Ship30for30 course. I hit 30 published essays in 30 days. I wrote about my lessons after 7 days https://bit.ly/ship30-7-days and 14 days https://bit.ly/ship30-14-days.

Additional lessons learned in daily writing and publishing for 30 days?👇

#1: 0 to published time averages around 75 mins

It took me just over an hour on average to go from “I have a topic” to “I hit the published button”.

Last year, I couldn't publish more than 2 articles in the whole year.

This involved, brain dump on a specific question/idea in the topic I want to write about, curating interesting information if I am not the expert, writing and organizing my essay, light-touch editing, and publishing.

Supporting pillars: writing constraints, Grammarly, and inspiration from fellow shippers

#2: Started seeing writing opportunities everywhere

Ship30 was condensing a lot of writing advice in 30 days.

I was loving any and all writing opportunities to try writing rhythms, various hooks and headlining techniques, rate of revelation, and get feedback on my writing. As an engineer and consultant, work presents lots of avenues to write in the form of emails, presentations, asynchronous communication with remote teammates, and answering technical questions in slack.

#3: No views is great news unless your livelihood depends on it

Social pressure can have adverse effects on the creativity and development of a newbie writer.

There are two types of essays, exploratory and professional content. The pendulum swings between the two and it’s hard to push a lot of good professional content from the get-go. So when no one engages with your writing in the beginning, it is liberating to really experiment and explore in your writing.

#4: 30 essays in 30 days challenge is a stretch but very attainable

1 month of daily writing is like any endurance activity. The middle of the race is hard.

“The beginning is typically fresh and exciting and goes by fast, while the end is the last push; but for me, the middle is where the real grind and biggest mental concentration and expenditure seems to be. The middle is where you have to stay engaged and really commit.”

  • Rachel Schneider (Professional Athlete)

You learn the most about writing hacks, your sacred writing hours, and what categories of your writing truly excite you.

What next after ship30for30?

A lot of experiments waiting to be done with the essays I created in Jan.