At the beginning of November, I posted an entry detailing my decision to participate in my first NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), a writing ‘contest’ held every November. It’s free and the goal is to get to 50,000 words by the end of the month. I wasn’t sure it was a good idea for me with all I had going on in November, but I wanted to bond with my writing group, and I felt like it was something every writer under the sun had done except for me.

Now that it’s over, here are my takeaways. Let’s start with the benefits:

A shot from our final Zoom write in. Almost the whole group was there.

My group did a few group Zoom sessions, and the lunchtime writing sessions were my favorite thing about NaNo. The focus that I got simply being in a meeting with other people, doing a Pomodoro writing sprint, was very gratifying. It did keep me from clicking around for distractions whenever I got into a rough spot, which led me to thinking about how distracted we all are most of the time.

As writers trying to build an audience, most people I know are maintaining some kind of social media platform. It’s very easy to click on over and see how your reel is doing, or do a quick scroll through and see if there’s anyone you can signal boost to support. But it’s also a break in the flow. And I find myself reaching for it when I get to a tough spot in my story.

When I was on those lunch meetings, I didn’t have time for that. I was sitting there, with other people, and we were focused on getting our words out and accomplishing, not only our goal, but our team goal. It somehow felt disrespectful for me to start scrolling social media. It made me think twice about how I treat my own writing time that I do carve out for myself. I should really make the effort to focus more during that time.

I was also pretty astounded by my output. I had my 50,000 by November 15th. Now, part of this was due to the fact that I knew I was going to be traveling for nine days around Thanksgiving and didn’t know how often I would get to write, so I was afraid of not making it. I put a lot of pressure on myself during those early days to get my words in. But, it’s good to know what I’m capable of. I had never measured word count before. Now I know that I can get in 3,000 a day if I put my mind to it.

It was a great bonding experience. Just being in the writing trenches with others in my group, chatting during the five minute breaks, and sometimes for a bit after the session was done, I got to know them better. It was a nice connection in the middle of the day, especially for someone like me who works from home and often only communicates with people via email for days at a time.

Since I was really focused on the words, I also didn’t answer emails or chat during my lunch break, which isn’t typical of me. Yes, when I was very tired, sometimes I would turn off my phone and set an alarm for a thirty minute nap after I ate, but many days I was responding to emails or chats while on my break, which makes it not a break. When I was embroiled in these sessions, I really gave my brain a respite from work. During the early part of the week, I work much longer days, so this was actually good for me.

I finished an entire novel. It’s the sequel to a work that I’m about to start submitting. I had no idea how it was going to end when I started it, which is typical of me, but I’ve only written a novel this fast one time before, and it was one that I was just in flow with. I was inspired and it just poured out of me. I knew that was rare.

The drawbacks.

I neglected some other things to get word count in. The house was a mess, I was often stressed because I was pushing my bedtime in order to finish what I needed to get done. I am very competitive person, and what’s more, I’m competitive with myself. It didn’t matter to me that I was the first one to get to 50,000. It didn’t matter to me that my word counts were usually on the high end. I wanted to see how far I could push it. I didn’t want to rest on my laurels and ‘make excuses’ that I was done already. I wanted to stay in there.

I remember looking at my count one night and thinking, “Come on, you’ve got to get over 3,000 today, you haven’t done it in days.” You know, because of Thanksgiving. And I actually thought to myself, “Sometimes I wish I wasn’t like this.” And then wondered if I could just… not be like this.

Spoiler alert, I can’t. At least not right now. It’s not a switch I was able to turn off. I got close to 4,000 words that night. So I am glad that that part is over.

My book is very short. Possibly the shortest I’ve ever written. I could see that this was going to happen when I was nearing the end. I told myself just to keep writing and I would go back later and fill it out. I will be interested to see what the hell I wrote this month. Honestly, I went back today and read a few early scenes and it was like I was reading them for the first time. They weren’t too bad, though. It was like I was in a fugue state when I was writing.

This may not end up being a big deal. I generally get a scene down and then go back over it and flesh it out. I’m not great at descriptions and such right off the bat, although I’m getting better. So this was most likely me telling myself the story in the most raw sense. I look forward to diving back in after a twelve day break.

Why twelve days? Because I have edits due on Ghost Tamer and they would like them early because we have a marketing opportunity and they’ll need the ARC. So I went ahead and let myself finish the book on the final day of NaNo. It’s out of my system for the time being and it probably needs to cool down. I’m ready for some nice, thoughtful editing.

Am I glad I did it? Yes, I am. I wanted to bond with my writing group and I got to do that. I learned more about myself as a writer and that’s always valuable. And I learned about procrastination and my focusing habits. Also helpful. I don’t regret spitting out a book either. (I’ll let you know later if I change my mind about that.)

Will I do it again? I’m not sure. I think it will largely depend on how this book turns out. And what I have going on next November. I was lucky this time in that I was able to turn in my initial edits early on November 2nd, and I didn’t get my new draft back until late on November 28th. I did do some work on it on the 29th, but will dive in seriously December first.

I write this entry during the final sprint with my group at 9:30pm on November 30th. We’re all trying to get a few more words in.

We’re going to keep up the group meetings, but add different goals. Editing, submissions, genre reading, craft study, etc., and mark those by hours. I’m excited that I’ll get some support as I work on my edits during lunch. I will be fun to throw those hours in the spreadsheet. And nice to feel like I don’t have to push it all to the end of the day.

So was NaNo worth it?

Yes. In the long run, I definitely think it was.

NaNoWriMo ~ Was it worth it?