Before the post, a little news. Some of you may have wondered: I\u2019m restarting my summer workshop this year. For writers from ten through high school age who live not impossibly far from Brewster, New York, it will run on Wednesdays from 1:30 to 3:00 for six weeks starting on July 6th. Interested writers need to commit for the whole time, although if you miss a week the world won\u2019t end. It\u2019s free, my gift to budding writers! If you\u2019re interested, you should call the Brewster library to sign up. You know I\u2019d love to have you.<\/p>\n
On December 4, 2015, Nessa wrote, Congratulations to everyone who finished NaNoWriMo! My sister and my best friend\u2019s brother encouraged me to do it this year, and I said I\u2019d try, but it was really only a half-hearted attempt. I ended up with a measly 2,900 words instead of 50,000. :\/ I think my biggest problem (besides schoolwork, and all the time-destroying other things I have to get done) is that I\u2019m a perfectionist. I don\u2019t really have an \u201cinner critic,\u201d exactly\u2013I\u2019ve read some less-than-stellar books before, and I figure if people like them, they\u2019ll like mine\u2013but whenever I write something, I always think, \u201cIt doesn\u2019t sound quite right,\u201d so I re-phrase it\u2026 and re-phrase it\u2026 and rephrase it. Getting 350 words in a day is basically a miracle. Anyone have any tips on how I can handle my debilitating writing perfectionism? (Seriously, it took me about an hour just to write this comment\u2026)<\/em><\/p>\n Lots of you chimed in.<\/p>\n NPennyworth: I think the only way to do this is remembering that nobody can manage to churn out a 50K word story perfectly on the first try. You may need to take a step back and remind yourself that you can fix it later, but you can\u2019t fix the story if you haven\u2019t written enough of it.<\/em><\/p>\n Melissa Mead: I can\u2019t remember where I saw this, who told me, but one writer said that rough drafts are basically putting clay on a wheel. You just pile clay\/words on. It\u2019s SUPPOSED to be a big messy lump. Then, when you get to an ending, you shape it into something beautiful.<\/em><\/p>\n Kitty: I feel you. I had the exact same problem until I discovered the various word crawls on the NaNo forums. They are super fun and addicting, and I found myself sprinting a couple thousand words a day and enjoying it. My fav is the Harry Potter one: (http:\/\/nanowrimo.org\/forums\/word-wars-prompts-sprints\/threads\/251242<\/a>), but there are plenty of others, from pirate themed to NaNo themed, to Mean Girls themed. The full list of those, and other activities, is here: (http:\/\/nanowrimo.org\/forums\/word-wars-prompts-sprints<\/a>). Maybe try one of those next year, or even just whenever you want to write. When you\u2019re focusing on getting words down so that you can progress to the next \u201clevel\u201d of the game, you\u2019ll find yourself focusing less on the quality of the words, and instead on the quantity, which is essentially what NaNo is about. Also, the timed word sprints really help get your pulse and mind racing, so that you\u2019re thinking less and writing more. Especially the fifty-headed-hydra. You won\u2019t have time to even think for that one. They are incredibly fun and addicting, and got me out of a rather large word count hole that I dug for myself after the second week.<\/em><\/p>\n That being said, just because you didn\u2019t meet the official word count goal and \u201cwin\u201d doesn\u2019t mean that you aren\u2019t a winner. You wrote 2,900 words, which is 2,900 words more than you had at the beginning of the month. You developed a consistent habit of writing, and that\u2019s something you should be very, very proud of. This pep talk (http:\/\/nanowrimo.org\/pep-talks\/n-k-jemisin<\/a>) and this blog post (http:\/\/blog.nanowrimo.org\/post\/134534953571\/didnt-win-nanowrimo-here-are-3-reasons-to<\/a>) say so themselves. So celebrate! You\u2019ve still accomplished a remarkable feat, and you should be extremely proud of yourself.<\/em><\/p>\n