NaNoWriMo’s Not For Me: An Alternative View Of Writing Goals And Expectations

Whether you complete 500 or 50,000 words in 30 days, you owe it to your Self to see your words through in a process that leaves you feeling accomplished and alive.

As we approach November, thousands of aspiring writers get swept up by the promise and energy of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). According to the NaNoWriMo website, “National Novel Writing Month began in 1999 as a daunting but straightforward challenge: to write 50,000 words of a novel in thirty days. Now, each year on November 1, hundreds of thousands of people around the world begin to write, determined to end the month with 50,000 words of a brand new novel.”

An amazing aspiration, right? Especially if you’ve had the dream of writing a book nagging the recesses of your mind. Might be like having an incredible goal of running a marathon or losing 50 pounds. Indeed, we aspire to accomplish huge goals. But what if you’ve never even ran a few miles or are unwilling to cut out sugar or alcohol? I’m not diminishing the importance of setting and achieving difficult goals, but I’m leery of the seduction of something we truly fantasize wanting cast against the unrealistic, but necessary, discipline we’ve likely never exhibited to achieve it.

Then what happens? We end up feeling worse about ourselves when we fall not-so-surprisingly short. Writers have enough internal struggle, resistance, and procrastination issues to wrestle with. We already posses an ample trove of disparaging self-talk and outlandish ways of describing blocks. These endless loops of desire, excitement, motivation, stalls, justifications, self-loathing, and non-creation are exhausting. Not to mention inspiration-depleting.

Find the approach that works for you

Before I expand on what might be an unpopular perspective, let’s agree there are benefits for whatever writing approach works for you. If intense deadlines, high expectations, and a community of others in a similar goal space are helpful for you, excellent! We need what we need to light that fire under our keyboards. I’ve had clients and students who have participated in NaNoWriMo and a few who have successfully made it to the end.

Yet, as an intuitive book coach, creative writing teacher, and retreat hostess, very often this is not the case. I’ve worked with hundreds of people who’ve sought my guidance and I’ve come to intimately understand the emotional labyrinth that accompanies people’s desire to write and what sustainably enables them to do it.

Completing a book is an extraordinary aspiration. Many harbor the dream. It takes time, space, creativity, intention, discipline, and resilience. It may also be as personal and deep as self-expression gets. Those words on the page spill from us. They may be windows to the soul, molecules of breath, expressions of being.

Of course, not every book is a life‘s manifesto or award winner. Sometimes books, including novels, are purely functional. Sometimes they’re instructional. Sometimes they support business goals. But no matter the writing end-game, there are elements of creation’s process that run deep.

What does writing mean to you?

My perspective on writing has evolved over time. I view writing as a conversation with one’s Self; an opportunity to connect at a deeper level; a profound engagement that provides the capacity for self-discovery through expression.

This is true whether one writes a novel, a memoir, or even a business book. Structure, deadlines, and high expectations may temporarily tear us from procrastination. What they don’t do, at least not over the long-haul, is provide richness, depth, or dimension to the creative process. Meaning, anybody can crank out words with the pressing weight of looming deadlines, structure, and expectations.

But how brilliant will your characters be? How honest, nuanced, or relatable are they? How well will you understand a character‘s motivation for their actions, or difficult choices they must make, if all your energy is diverted into completing a designated word count by 8pm Tuesday? Creativity seems less likely to thrive in that demanding environment. I’m not saying it never happens or can’t happen. I’m only speaking to what years of intuitive book coaching and teaching have shown me: writing with the taskmaster of expectation sternly looming isn’t conducive to creativity or true productivity. Then, of course, comes the issue of quality.

Open skies and nagging desires

There are certain elements in novel writing, including development of characters, dynamic plots, narrative arcs, engaging dialogue, contextual setting, and landscapes that require description. Reflection. Navigation. Negotiation. These take an open sky, not a compressed container, to allow an organic narrative process. We want words to coalesce with imagination so our stories come alive.

Typically, when people come to me, they’re in a state of both creative pain and nagging desire. They bring with them a conflicted bag of practical writing-ability obstacles, creative constipation, and motivational restraints — all cowering in the shadow of expectation. It’s easier to focus on an end result of what a book will be, do, or produce than the messy layers of fear, lack of confidence, and overwhelm that keep us stuck in the first place. Can you see by the very nature of this goal set-up we’re bound for misdirection before we even start?

Not to mention that too often with these highly-public aspirational challenges comes the beast of comparison — self-loathing judgments and critiques accompany being on the sidelines watching fellow aspirationalists share their wildly successful word counts and novel progressions.

What’s holding you back?

When it comes down to actually writing, sitting at a desk and facing your words, what are you afraid of? Failure? Judgement? Not producing work that’s worthy of being read? Are you overwhelmed by where to begin with organizing or taming all these characters who constantly speak to you?

Are you really someone who needs high-stakes pressure, tight deadlines, and a huge challenge to get you moving? Is this enormous expectation effective for maintaining progress?

Why do you want to write? What’s beneath the heart of your desire? A need to explore? Express? Create or connect meaning? A pure love of painting with words? Challenging yourself with use of imagery, compelling dialogue, or crafting a tightly-woven tale?

What if there were ways to UNlearn what we’ve been conditioned to believe as truth about writing? Or what books are supposed to feel like, be like, be structured like? What if you could erase the fear of rejection and embrace fearless creative freedom?

What happens to your valid, textured reasons of why you get stuck in the first place? Can you give those fears, judgements, or doubts attention so they might be forever eradicated from stalling your inspiration and words?

Whatever you decide, keep your Self in mind

I’ll say it again: I’m not poo-poo-ing NaNoWriMo as an opportunity to aim high. Get creating. Immerse in your dream of writing a novel. That’s amazing if you’re at the place and have courage and willingness to let your words fly. Any writing, whether it’s poetry, a memoir, blog post, or novel, requires courage. I applaud your bravery.

Just be kind to your Self as you embark on this quest, and clear-eyed about its set-up and potential pitfalls. Whether you complete 500 or 50,000 words in 30 days, you owe it to your Self to see your words through in an honest process that leaves you feeling accomplished and alive.