NaNoWriMo mental tricks

When I planned out my writing activities for the month of November, taking into account the demands of National Novel Writing Month (yes, I do those things), I made sure I had my weekly blogs ready to go for the first two Wednesdays before NaNo started. This week I scheduled a NaNo update; next week (the day before Thanksgiving) will be my annual holiday rant (feel free to skip that one if you’re one who actually likes those events), with the last post of the month as a celebration of my anticipated NaNo victory.

Eh, maybe not so much. But I’m trying.

NaNo has been a struggle this year, but for different reasons than in my past efforts (2005, 2006 – both of which I completed successfully, thank you very much). As new homeowners with tons of yard work demanding attention before the snow flies, I’ve managed to do absolutely no writing on the weekends, which means I’m way behind. At this point, I should be over 25K. At the close of business Tuesday the fifteenth (mid-point), I was at 22,332. Not bad, but not on track for the win.

Back to the scheduling thing. Because I'm using NaNo to finish a WIP instead of the traditional new-book-in-a-month goal, I've found a different way to motivate myself. In addition to the daily NaNo word count, because I like round numbers (they’re comforting somehow), I can use the NaNo overall total as a marker. That also works for the grand total on the WIP. All told, I now have three different mileposts to shoot for; whichever one is closest to the magical zero-ending total is my carrot on a stick.

Yes, I'm a bit strange. You’ve just realized that? My son says I think too much, and he’s probably right.

Anyway, my mid-point NaNo effort stands at 22,332 words, with a grand total of 50,717 for the WIP.

I’ll call that a win. For now.