Way to cheat 74HC595 maximum continuous operating current?

Yes, that's actually what my original design was, but it requires a lot more wiring to deal with......

Also, I'm aware that the brightness of the LEDs will be reduced if you switch the segments on/off at a fast rate, but how exactly would I do this in code? Would it require some indeterminate for loop that continuously turns a segment on/off at a desirable rate or is there some library function to accomplish this?