National Novel Writing Month

taladraco:

November 1-30. The world needs your novel.

Patrick Rothfuss is a really good author and he makes a lot of good points here… I’d like to share my own story about a time I lost NaNoWriMo.

Several years ago, I learned about this event. The first couple of years I tried it, I lost. Looking back, I honestly couldn’t even tell you why I started. I wasn’t a writer. I didn’t care about things like being published. I honestly didn’t care about much. I didn’t think I was good at anything. Sure there was stuff I had fun doing, but being good at it? Not me.

I think it was a friend who talked me into it. At the time, I had written some OC sailor moon fanfics. OC in that, while they were set in the Sailor Moon world, I didn’t use any of the established characters. I made up my own.

I didn’t think I would win that first year I tried this. But maybe it was boredom, maybe it was something else, but I decided, what the hell, and dove in.

That first novel was awful. Oh my god was it terrible. That’s not even an exaggeration of the creating artist. It’s just a fact.

And I got discouraged, I will admit.

But you know what it did for me?

It got me thinking. The story was terrible and I am pretty sure I deleted that file. But the idea? The idea was pretty okay. And man, did I enjoy creating the characters. That was fun.

I don’t remember if I did it the next year. But I did eventually try again. With a different story.

Again, I failed to capture what I wanted. But this time the story stuck with me. This time, I didn’t feel like such an abject failure.

Fast forward two more years and that second story that I wanted to write, I finally finished.

And it was good.

Oh it had a lot of work, but it wasn’t a failure. Not this time. I am still working on it, but I did it. I finally finished. And I was proud of myself.

NaNoWriMo isn’t just about hitting that finish line. It’s about running the race. It doesn’t matter if you don’t think you’ll ever publish what you write. I doubt I will. I doubt anyone would want to read my drabble.

But it gives you a sense of accomplishment. It really does. It doesn’t even have to be writing. Whatever you have fun doing, even if you aren’t that great, you will be happier if you start, than if you never try.