National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)

I remember thinking last year when I found out about National Novel Writing Month that I should do it next time.Well, I did. And I met the challenge, finishing the required minimum of 50,000 words a few days early. The book itself is not finished, but I think it’s about two-thirds of the way there. I learned a lot from and about my writing during the past twenty-four days:

1. Apply math. Once I had the 50,ooo word goal imposed upon me by the higher power (via Chris Baty), I divided it by 25, figuring I may not be able to waddle over to the computer after Thanksgiving dinner, and maybe there would be some unforseen events; better to have a buffer (I’m all about the buffer).I had to put writing the book first. I always said I was going to, but I (hardly) ever did. This month, if I hadn’t yet “written my 2,000 words” that day, I tried not to do anything else until I had.
2. My family walked the talk: they always said they would help out with household chores if I was writing, and they really did. Dishes, laundry, meal prep…when I was writing, everyone pitched in (well, mostly my husband), and didn’t complain at all.
3. There is time to write every day, and having a goal helped tremendously. When I read Stephen King’s book On Writing, this was a point he stressed as well. Before the challenge, I tried setting a goal to write 15 minutes a day, but I had trouble sticking to that. Writing 2000 words often took from 2 to 5 hours, depending on the number of interruptions (from kids, meal breaks, etc) but I did manage to stick to that. Go figure.
4. My friends were and are very supportive. People (you know who you are!) went out of their way to tell me how much they liked reading what I write, and this was tremendously motivating all month long. Thank you so much!
5. My husband is the best. Bill, YOU ROCK!

Now, the challenge for me will be to see if I can keep up the 2,000 words per day until the actual book, and not just the challenge, is finished.Here’s hopin’. :)Winner!