A year ago I celebrated my first NaNoWriMo win. This year, I’m delighted (and proud) to celebrate my second NaNoWriMo win on a project that has been stewing in my mind for over 8 years. Getting 50k words of this novel down is far more satisfying than I imagined it would be even though I have a ways to go before the first draft is complete.

Making tangible progress on a dream is a sweet, sweet thing to savor, but it took a lot of hard work to get there. Here’s a few of the key things that helped me get to my second NaNoWriMo win:

• Understanding My Why

  Inevitably, there were multiple days and nights when trying to get words on the page felt hopeless. Common obstacles like being drained of mental and physical energy, having a blank mind, having no idea how to connect the dots in my novel or having plot holes the size of black holes, would make me want to throw in the towel and quit. It helped to think about why I started on the NaNoWriMo journey with this specific novel. Once I remembered all the reasons this novel was important to me, it was easier to get my fingers to the laptop to get words down.

• Being OK with Not Having All the Answers

  A lot of writers get stuck in the perfectionist trap, feeling like they can’t get the words on the page unless they’re perfect. This particular obstacle is one of my biggest NaNoWriMo road blocks and can keep me staring at a blank page for hours if I allow it. Thankfully, I leaned into the NaNoWriMo writing community this year and was encouraged by the notion that I don’t have to have all the answers in order to write the first draft. I don’t need to know how to end a chapter. I don’t need to know how to shift from one scene to the next. I don’t need to know how a character would respond in a situation. All of those “don’t knows” I will learn along the way (during revisions and other drafts). But for the first draft, I just need to get what I do know down, and a bare bones draft is better than no draft at all.

• Having Compassion, Empathy and Flexibility

  Life happens. And life happened a lot for me this November. There were many days where what was happening outside of my writing was far more important and writing took the back seat. As an ambitious perfectionist, instead of feeling like this was reasonable, I felt like I was incapable of “doing it all.” Why couldn’t I work through the things going on in life AND hit my word goal each day? There must be something wrong with me if I can’t do it all. I really had to lean into having compassion and empathy for myself this NaNoWriMo or all of that negative self talk would have made it impossible for me to reach my goals. There were days where I was no where near the word count and it took a lot of self love to tell myself that not hitting a word count goal was OK (it is okay!). I also needed to be more flexible with my schedule. If I didn’t hit the word count on a given day, it was OK to make up for it on other days when I had the time and energy to do so. A NaNoWriMo win isn’t any more (or less) valid if you don’t write 1,667 words on every single day, or hit 50k in a month. NaNoWriMo can mean something different to each writer and it’s important to have flexibility in NaNo goals, too!

• Sprinting Saves the Day (Once Again)

  I owe much of my word count to the official NaNoWriMo sprint leaders and a new sprinting community, Magical Word Sprints. There’s something about sprints that makes a daily word count seem more manageable. Each sprint breaks a big goal down into manageable chunks, and when there’s fun sprinting games like the NaNo House Cup (#teamhufflepuff), Star Wars Light side vs Dark side and Team Captain America vs Team Iron Man, NaNoWriMo feels less like work and more like fun. Plus, it helps to know you’re deep into the writing trenches with others, which bring me to my next key thing …

• Expanding My Support Community

  I’m fortunate to have family and close friends for my biggest cheerleaders, whether in writing or in general. But as I’ve learned throughout the year by getting more involved in the kidlit community, there are incredible benefits to having a supportive writing community, too. This year I made a point to get more involved in my local NaNoWriMo community. One of the local writers created a Discord board and it has been AMAZING for connecting with fellow Wrimos. I’ve leaned into conversations on our Discord during the tough times, the good times and the procrastinating times (we have a specific board for memes which has been quite the time suck but also the quick refresh when needed). I also went to in person events which was intimidating at first, but ended up being fine and fun because the NaNoWriMo community continues to be welcoming and encouraging (we’re all in this 50k journey together)! I also shared my NaNoWriMo goals with a few writer friends at work, which was scary but also empowering. They understood the importance of the goal, and how hard it can be to tackle words after the day job, which was an extra level of support and empathy I appreciated.

• Having a (Better) Outline

  Last year I had a loose outline that worked well enough to get me to the NaNo finish line. This year, I tried the first method as outlined in Nano Prep 101, where I wrote down all of my scenes, and then went through and organized them into Beginning, Middle and End of my novel. This method is very similar (or maybe identical) to the note card method I’ve heard of, and it worked well for me on my first time trying it. Once I had my scenes sorted, I created each scene as a text document in Scrivener which allowed me to see my entire outline at a glance. I’m still getting used to Scrivener, but so far I’m finding the program makes it easy to move scenes around as I realize what may be out of order, missing, etc. Having a more complete outline enabled me to have something to sit down and work on every time, versus trying to come up with scenes as the month went on.

NaNoWriMo isn’t for everyone. I’ve learned that I need the deadline and the intensity of NaNo to force myself to sit down and do the work. For others, the intensity and duration of NaNo may not be conducive to their writing goals or work style and that’s okay! What’s important is that a writer finds what works for them, and NaNoWriMo works for me. I already know what my NaNoWriMo project for 2020 will be, but until then, I’m going to celebrate this big milestone on my writing journey (and get some sleep)!