Officially, I’ve been NaNoWriMo-ing for the past six years. For those of you who don’t know, or manage to survive the modern writing life without getting inundated with emails and social invites to its events, NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, is an annual event in many a writerly circle.

Free to participate in, NaNoWriMo is more of a movement about empowering artists to work on their craft and support each other in a mad dash challenge to write a novel (or really 50,000-word first draft of one anyway) in 30 days, every November. Forever.

No, I kid. But there’s no denying NaNoWriMo has its fanatics, it’s almost maniacal devotees. You know the type––those people who spend the month of October systematically plotting and planning their upcoming NaNoWriMo run, and keep to a rigorous schedule with a kind of dedication and absolute mastery of time management that has always, and I fear always will, evade me. They outline their plot, they join supportive meet-up groups of other NaNoWriMoers, they build their entire schedule a month ahead of time around large blocks of uninterrupted creative flow with daily word count requirements to hit. It’s no small commitment. The people who succeed––the true NaNoWriMoers––treat it like the literary marathon that it is, and like any marathon, you can’t just decide to do it, show up on the day of and expect to

It’s no small commitment. The people who succeed––the true NaNoWriMoers––treat it like the literary marathon that it is, and like any marathon, you can’t just decide to do it, show up on the day of and expect to finish, much less place. That is the lesson I learned after two failed NaNoWriMo attempts, and I haven’t been back since. I’ve always been attracted to the idea, at least partially because, like any fledgling writer, I tend to resort to self-blame at the first sign of a misstep or failure along the path. This applies to literally any unmet writing goal, entirely amorphous or fully formed as it may be. The reality of my block is probably closer to an inability to be realistic with my expectations paired with the usual amount of millennial resistance due to the sense of exceptionalism that appears to have been hardwired into our personalities. That intertwined with deep-seeded self-doubt and shame over said exceptionalism. Either way, I’ve always looked fondly onto the idea that I could break through all that junk and actually get a major writing project done (or at least seriously started) in a month all through the power of my own will.

But I’ve always been attracted to the idea, at least partially because, like any fledgling writer, I tend to resort to self-blame at the first sign of a misstep or failure along the path. This applies to literally any unmet writing goal, entirely amorphous or fully formed as it may be.

The reality of my block is probably closer to an inability to be realistic with my expectations paired with the usual amount of millennial resistance due to the sense of exceptionalism that appears to have been hardwired into our personalities. That intertwined with deep-seeded self-doubt and shame over said exceptionalism. Either way, I’ve always tinkered fondly (albeit from afar) over the idea that I could break through all that junk and actually get a major writing project done (or at least seriously started) in a month all through the power of my own damn will.

The mistake I made most in the past (and still make quite often) was allowing myself to proceed with a lack of focus. Every time I tried to NaNo, I would write feverishly for several days, usually in conjunction with my morning pages, and then something would happen midweek, I’d miss a day, and before I knew it two weeks had gone by and I’d have to type 9,000 words a day to even get close to making it in time. I dropped off because I was directionless, and it felt more like grinding out words of nothingness than writing.

I’m not saying it wouldn’t have been hard to finish the month out even with a strong idea to fuel the work. Of course, it’s a challenge––that’s the idea: to test yourself and see if you can buckle down and channel all that creative energy spewing out in every which direction into a regimented boot camp of writerly productivity. I’m sure for some people this works well, and for others, not so much. I’ve no idea if it will work for me because I’ve honestly never really tried with my whole self in it, but part of me fears I’m a part of the latter (most likely that same inner critic that has me constantly doubting my own capacity for creative success in the first place, that bitch).

Thinking back, I blame my overly casual demeanor going into the whole thing. But I’m always that way about writing––I remember the good times, when the words just flow, and often forget that moments of inspiration cannot be called upon, and we must instead learn to foster them when they do come. So when I started getting the regular pre-NaNo emails (and I mean serious emails… so many EMAILS!) it got me thinking that maybe if I actually tried to focus my writing into one idea rather than letting it be a free-for-all for my daily thoughts (which I already have my 750words for), I would be able to get on board the NaNoWriMo bandwagon and become a crazy writing fanatic too.

We’ll see what happens. But for now, I leave you with this NaNoWriMo infographic from Stop Procrastinating.