How's your hair?

Are you pulling your hair out over NaNo yet?  Last year at this time I was stressed beyond belief and driving my very patient and sympathetic husband crazy.  Every evening I would sit in front of the computer and “force” myself to write 1667 words a day to ensure that at the end of the month I had record 50,000 words.  You can imagine how  fun living with me was last November.  :)

On the eve of November 30th, I had managed to “win” at NaNo, but at what cost?  My sanity?  My poor husband’s sanity?  Then I jumped into a month of hardcore revision hell that didn’t help my frustration. 

This year when I started to struggle with the words because of the pressure that I put on myself to achieve those 1667 words, I stopped and moved far away from my computer and focused on another task. I stopped fearing those 1667 words and instead when I sat down for “my” writing time, I didn’t look at a clock or at the number of words that I had currently typed.  I just focused on finding my inner muse and allowing my characters to inspire me. 

The second week of NaNo had hit me hard as once again I found myself tapped, but I didn’t stress.  Instead, I took a few days off to focus on other things going on in my life and then when I felt like it, I returned to writing.  On the first day after the break, I wrote for three hours and chocked up 4700 words.  Day Two was great again with 3450 words. 

Through trial and error, I’ve learned that for me to get through NaNo, I had to throw away the calculation word count and just write from my heart.  There are some days that I just don’t feel like writing, so I take them off and I am even hungrier to get back to my story the next day.

Good luck to you all!  However you are feeling or doing, just remember nine more days and normal life can begin again!

RJ :)