There's only one video game I've ever gotten any good at. It's Rogue Legacy. If you haven't played it, it's really fun and very simple. I have maxed out the stats and equipment, I've found all the fairy chests, I've found all the blueprints, I've beaten all five bosses (I haven't beaten the four alternate special bosses, I don't care to but I'm not sure I could even if I did care to, I'm not actually great at video games) and finished the story line. And I still play it sometimes, just running through the castle amassing gold that I can't even spend on anything anymore. Useless gold. I love it. It's instant gratification, baby. Look at that number climb higher and higher.
I have a real problem with instant gratification, in more or less every aspect of my life. It's probably even why I don't take care of my health as well as I should. And it can definitely impact my writing.
Word count tracking! Oh man. When I hand-wrote everything it was too tedious to track my daily word count. I tried for a while, I would mark in the margin of a page where I was when I started writing in the morning, and then at the end of the day I'd count out the words in five lines, get the average of about how many words I wrote per line, then multiply that by how many lines I'd written. It was never exact, though, and it didn't feel super concrete. It wasn't as helpful. When I switched to writing on my laptop I would ctrl+f the phrase that I started on that morning and then at the end of the day highlight what I'd written and check the word count of the highlighted selection. That was a lot more helpful, much better motivation for someone like me. And then finally I checked out nanowrimo.org and found their stat tracking page, which you can use for non-nanowrimo writing projects any time of the year. Oh guys I love it. I can compete with my own daily word count. I can set a writing goal and then try to beat it. It's totally arbitrary, like the gold I earn in Rogue Legacy, and I love it just the same. Look at that number climb higher and higher!
I see a lot of bad advice about word count tracking. Nonsense prescriptive advice. “If you don't write X amount of words in a month/week/day then you're not a real writer/not dedicated enough/not taking it seriously.” I cannot stress enough how much I don't mean this like that. Instant gratification and useless competition against my own self is just a huge motivating factor for me. I can churn out a first draft when I can look at that line graph and see how far ahead of my own self-determined goal I am. Instant gratification. I enter in my updated word count sometimes after five-minute bouts of writing if I'm having a hard time getting into the flow. Oh I love it. It helps me so much. Instead of struggling against my need for self-gratification and seeing it as a detriment I've embraced it and it's actually become an asset, at least for writing my first drafts.
Now, holy moley, if I could just figure out how to assign a point-system to revisions and editing, then I'd really be in business.