One of the nicest things about 750 Words is the list of my most commonly used words that it gives me at the bottom of my stats every day. It's been very instructive to learn what terms I overuse, like "really", "like", "though", "think", and others. It's helped me cut down on qualifiers, as I've seen certain offending words disappear over time. We actually had a discussion about qualifiers in Writers Group this past Saturday, and it really made me think about how often I use them in my own writing. For example, I often talk about how I "think" something is the case, even when I don't have any strong doubts about it. I'm not entirely sure how I use "like" the most---whether it's through similes, giving examples, or talking about preferences. Maybe it's a combination of the three. I know that I don't use it as an interjection in print, because lord knows how irritating that would get. At any rate it's a weak word, and I should cut down on it. Of course the point of these entries isn't to write perfectly, it's just to write. I shouldn't stop myself for word choice during NaNo, since the whole point of it is to quickly produce a rough draft that I can then revise with better word choices (and possibly better plot and character choices, depending on how seriously I go off track). If I don't catch myself now though, I'll never be able to hone my instincts to make the correct choices sooner. After all, I don't always have the time to proofread what I write, and I'd like to know that there's a good possibility that I got things right the first time.
One particularly troublesome word I've been trying to strike from my commonly used list is "thing". It's one of the most vague nouns in the world, and as a result it suggests itself all the time. Often there's a better word waiting right around the corner if I give it an extra moment's thought, but sometimes I'm dealing with a category so broad that I'd need to completely redefine my argument in order to bring a more specific term to the surface, and I'm not always prepared to do that.
Something else I've noticed in the statistics of my daily entries is that I'm a lot more introspective on the days when I'm thinking of posting my entry to my blog. I don't talk about my recent activities as much, and I try not to be as judgmental of others, which often leads to me not talking about others at all. Does that really make an entry more worthy of being shared with other people? I mean, I'm not naive: I know that there can be real, damaging consequences to the wrong person reading an opinion that I should have just kept to myself in the first place, and I don't want to overstep the bounds of my confidentiality agreement when I talk about my job. There's a layer of self consciousness to it too though, and I need to try and peel that back as much as I can. Not that I have any obligations to anybody, but there are a lot of parts of my life that could benefit from me being more open and honest (as long as I choose my words carefully, at least).
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