For many, NaNoWriMo presents an opportunity for writers to join together for an entire month to create a novel. It’s a opportunity for writers to feel the effects of a deadline, and learn how to use it for good to drive writing a novel. For others however, it represents a month of let downs, pressure, and missed opportunities.
There are a number of factors why some fail NaNoWriMo. I’ve written a great deal over the last year about it. I’ve listed surprising reasons you failed NaNo, the number one reason you failed Nano, what factors combined to make you fail Nano, and I’ve written over the last week step by step instructions that if you follow will guarantee you pass NaNoWriMo.
Maybe.
Presuming you want to win Nano.
Some people work hard to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by adopting disastrous mind sets and attitudes. These attitudes do nothing more than ensure you fail year after year. I’m not pulling any punches on this or trying to spare feelings, because I have to break writers of this mindset. I want you to succeed. And you know it’s true, because there’s no link at the bottom of this blog post inviting you to join my limited space, time limited writing academy.
The Pressured One
Some writers believe that once they start feeling “pressured” to win NaNoWriMo, they can just walk away – starting out the process with a mindset of quitting before they even begin. They even tweet their intent to cave in as soon as pressure mounts. What do you think you’ll feel if you get your dream – a publishing contract and literary agent? You’re going to have deadlines and pressure. The first thing I recommend is that you delete that tweet, because any prospective literary agent is going to look at your social media to see if you’re a good match. That tweet is enough for many to say, “Not interested.” It tells them you’re going to miss one deadline after another, and no literary agent is going to risk their reputation to present a writer to a publisher that cannot meet deadlines.
NaNoWriMo is your chance to prove yourself, to show you can write under pressure, produce novels. If you can do so with both results and excitement, agents will take a risk with you. They don’t want to coddle a writer just to get them to do their job.
If you quit when you’re facing a one month deadline to write a 50,000 word draft, how will you react when they ask for a 30 day cover to cover re-write of an 85,000 word novel? If there’s enough flaws, publishers ask for that.
Dealing with Deadline Fever
Learn to ride the pressure. Most successful jobs today involve pressure and deadlines. Ask any teenager who gets their first job at a McDonalds about pressure and deadlines – theirs involve minutes, not months. Learn to adapt to the pressure. People can talk themselves out of any opportunity. NaNo is a great one to prove to an agent you can work under pressure. It doesn’t mean you’ll be deluged with calls if you finish NaNo – far from it – but certainly it’s something to put in your resume or a throwaway mention in a query letter that you wrote the first draft in 24 days during NaNoWriMo. “Okay, they work under pressure.”
Focus on this – This is your opportunity, just like a contestant on a TV show – you’ve got a month to (fill in the blank). Take advantage of it, and finish your novel. This is your big chance to prove yourself – don’t waste it!
The Pollyanna
This is of course a reference to an old movie about a girl who was an optimist. I borrowed this term to describe the ones who say, “I’ll do NaNo while its fun. Once it stops being fun, I stop.”
Here’s the catch – if writing is not fun, don’t do it at all! We write because we enjoy it, and we write because it’s something we’re drawn to. It’s who we are. (Yellow house reference!)
Is NaNoWriMo a joy killer?
NaNo doesn’t affect whether writing is fun. It’s like playing music. You do it because it’s fun and satisfying. You may hate the stress before a recital or a concert, but you’re still going to play the music. And that part will be fun.
My first NaNo was very exciting. It was also very stressing because my computer crashed last year, and I lost essentially three days. Had I just committed to something I couldn’t do? Apparently not – I STILL finished early, and MAN it is a good book! I almost can’t add anything else to it to bring it to genre standards.
That created my stress. Without it, I was doing aces. I would have finished probably November 20th if my computer hadn’t crashed, so the stress was unwarranted! No matter whether I was stressed by the deadline, I still loved the writing!
So write. Finish your novel. Have fun.
The wanderer
There are many NaNoWriMo writers whom I dub the “Wanderers”. Far more of those than the Pollyannas who want to toss it when it’s not fun. The Wanders quit wandering VERY early in NaNo, usually by day 7. Why? You wrote 400 words day one, then 250 day 2, 200 day three, etc.
What happened? You didn’t plan your novel. You had no idea what you were going to write, OR you had an idea about a character. A Character is not a novel. How a character fulfills the plot of the novel is the novel. Go back to November 1 and re-read every article I’ve written – the answers you’re looking for is there! To paraphrase John Wayne (and use my usual mirrored phrases) “Winners never quit. Quitters never win.”
I’ve told you how to plan your novel, start to finish. I told you how to set up three writing programs for a novel, step by step – fast keys included. All you have to do is tune out every other distraction, plan your novel, and WIN!
Do!
Here’s the answer – write. Winners never quit. Quitters never win. Proper planning prevents poor performance. Fail to plan, plan to fail. Never stop fighting till the fighting’s done.
Write your novel.
And ignore EVERY TWEET (there’ll be dozens) that try to ROB you of your victory Nov. 30th by telling you, “If you wrote one word, you won NaNo.”
No, you lost it. NaNoWriMo requires a word count of 50,000 words. The aim of NaNoWriMo is to finish a novel in 30 days. If you wrote and completed a novel of 50,000 words in 30 days, you won NaNo. Anything else, you lost it.
Writers write. If you don’t write, what are you?
I’m giving you the tools to succeed. I’m giving you permission to win.
Win.
