Annnndddd....they're off!!
(Is it coincidence that National Novel Writing Month kicked off on the same day as the New York Marathon? I think it's probably not!) Good luck and happy writing to all those attempting this year's NaNoWriMo! Good luck, too, to those who aren't officially na-no-ing, but who are hunkered down with revisions, or focusing on writing picture book manuscripts, or on illustration work, or whose lives/personal creative processes don't line up well with the rules of NaNo, but who are trying to stay deeply focused on their creative life this month, nonetheless.
I have only one small word of advice for you writerly types: JOY. Over the next 30 days--amidst the discipline, and the insanity, and the word counts, and the late nights and early mornings and other stolen moments of writing, and the self-induced pressure and resultant potential meltdowns, and visions of proud sharing of your story, and the desire to "win" Nano--may you, most of all, find true joy in the simple act of placing words on pages, and in the creative life you're living out, day by day!
Thanks for the pep talk - I'll need it. As a neophyte nanoist and a new, unpublished writer, I expected to be ready for a padded room by December. But I chose my operative word to be FUN. Now I'll add JOY.
ReplyDelete@benwoodard
Thank you, Molly!
ReplyDeleteJOY is a great mantra.
It's nice to hear something positive from the publishing side regarding Nano. Many of the blogs I've read recently have conjured up images of Munch's "The Scream". I've never done Nano, mainly because I can knock out 1667 (or whatever) words a day pretty easily. Either way, thanks for this post.
ReplyDelete(I'm doing NanoREVISEmo anyway...)
@Ben FUN is a great goal, too. I think they go together, really!
ReplyDelete@Eliza Are you Nano-ing? JOY is a good mantra for revisions, too....
@Bryan The screaming comes once novice NaNo-ers begin trying to submit their (still-totally-unpolished) manuscripts come Dec. 1st. But I can never be anything but pro- something that helps people take the plunge toward achieving their creative goals!(P.S. Good luck w/ the revising!)
I don't do Nano--but I love this post anyway. Thanks for the reminder to focus on the joy. That can get lost too easily!
ReplyDeleteGreat advice! If there's no joy in what we do, then why bother?
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I'm going into this with the plan of having FUN. It'll be a crazy ride, but I want to enjoy it and the story that comes pouring out.
ReplyDeleteMolly: Have you seen John Green's Nano video? It is really good...my favorite part was him saying how Nano gives new/old/all writers permission to suck. :)
ReplyDeleteOh, revision is a bad word in the Bliss house lately...
Actually, that's not true. It just makes me feel better to say it. MB is awesome. Even his seemingly off-the-cuff ideas have made the book better.
B
Thanks for the JOY comment. I'm running a middle school NaNo group this year. I'll never "win" because I'm not writing the required 50,000 words for adults, but I am going to try to get a *first* draft of my beginner reader/picture book done this month. And, I'm having a lot of JOY watching the 6th graders get immersed. Love your blog.
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