"Write Every Day" and all that jazz

A few years ago I read a book about becoming a writer that basically said if you cannot sit down and write something - anything - once a day, you frankly don't have what it takes to be a writer. I think I set down the book after that and mumbled something resembling pshaw. It's not that I thought writing regularly wasn't important, I just didn't buy that if there was a day where you managed to get zero words on the page, you'd never succeed.

We hear all the time of the importance of writing every day. After all, if you write even ten words every day, eventually you will have a finished draft. It might take a while, but it will happen. But if you write 2,000 words, then go out of town for the weekend and write none, well... that's still considerable progress.

Over the past few months I've been doing a lot of revisions, so the new WIP I began in December was very neglected. I was still active in my writing, just not in that project. And as the weeks of revisions for the other project passed, I started wondering if my new WIP was really striking my fancy after all. I opened it up when I had the chance and tried to make some progress on it, but I just kept filling in little scenes I already knew would happen. I struggled to really get going on it, or brainstorm any new scenes or components.

When I finally finished the revisions, I reread everything I'd already written in the WIP to reacquaint myself. Then I wrote some. And the next day I wrote some more. Finally, I was able to focus on it, and as a result I'd get random ideas and inspiration while I walked to work or when I was taking my shower - times when I wasn't even thinking about it intentionally.

I just had finals and all the craziness that finals create, and there were days when I didn't have the chance to write. But because I was writing that book more days than not, it was on my mind even on the days I couldn't put any words on the page. Essentially, I made progress just by having the work engaged in my mind.

That, I think, is the true benefit of writing every day. It's not the number of words on the page, it's the motivation and inspiration that comes from having the story in the front of your mind rather than the back. It is so much easier to sit down and write now than when I only had a chance to look at it once a week, because I'm not sitting down trying to remember where I left off and what happened last in a certain sub-plot. I'm accidentally solving sub-plot issues when I'm doing other things, like watching TV, merely because writing nearly every day leaves me engaged with the story every day.

Do you write every day? What are your feelings on the "Write Every Day" mantra?