Will You NaNoWriMo?

I’m an ardent fan of NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month. The website and community offers an incredible motivation to writers of all kinds to stop talking about writing a novel and just sitting down and actually doing it. I love getting their pep talks in my inbox (here’s one of my absolute favorites, from Lemony Snicket), I love the word count tools to track my progress, and I love the way it gets everyone excited about writing!

But…I’m not sure I can participate this year. I’ve competed as a writer twice, and one year used the motivation as incentive to finish editing a novel that had been collecting dust. I’m so proud of those finished works, even while I figure out what to do next in publishing them. But I’ve got more of “real life” on my plate this year, between work things, family things, editing projects, and trying to keep myself in balance. I’m not sure I can push any of those other things off, to wait for a month, like I’ve been able to in the past.

I’m not going to step away from NaNo completely; like I said, I love it to bits and I think it provides more motivation in a month than I can generate in a year. So I’m going to try to compromise: I won’t officially take on the challenge this year, but I am going to try to use my spare time well, writing what I can when I’m able and otherwise trying to push forward on Undead Rising.

Because, even though I forget sometimes, NaNoWriMo isn’t the only time I can write a novel. I can write all year: I just have to make it a priority.

Will you be participating this year? What are your obstacles and how will you try to overcome or manage them?