In several places I’ve seen the declaration that it takes 1,000,000 words to be a really good writer.

Leaving aside the arbitrariness of the number and the implied assumption that quantity leads to quality (since I will admit the two are related), I checked out my own record against this.

And I’m barely half-way there.

Okay, technically I did scrape together over a half-mil, but that was with *everything* over 300-words I’ve got on this computer: including old school papers and my 3 months of daily foster-care notes.

Half of that is my estimate of word-count from my blogging the last three years, and maybe a quarter could be attributed to my novels.

There’s a reality check for me.

Every now and then I think I write a lot, and this new measuring stick is like a reminder of the Biblical admonition Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves.

Too often we evaluate ourselves (in every arena) in relation to what others are doing, when the only healthy ways to evaluate are against what we were and against what we’re called to be.

Those should be enough to cheer, shame, and challenge us without adding other people to the equation.