What I’ve Learned From NaNo So Far
November 15th, 2006 by Marsha Moyer
1. Writing really does = ass in chair. Even when I’m feeling bored or cranky, the act of booting up MS Word and reading the last few paragraphs I wrote the day before gets the juices flowing (or at least dripping).
2. Muses are sneaky and mercurial. Just because yours isn’t waking you at two in the morning with bursts of inspiration doesn’t mean she’s not lurking inside your fingertips, waiting to reveal herself one word at a time on your computer screen.
3. On the other hand, sometimes, like a long-time lover you’ve come to take for granted, she’s still capable of nice surprises: the perfect way to end a scene, like a bouquet for no reason at the end of a dreary day; a completely unexpected plot turn that suddenly, like an impulsive trip to a secret destination, reveals scenery you would otherwise never have known existed.
4. Sometimes you have to look outside yourself for inspiration. Yesterday, en route to a doctor’s appointment, I was mulling over how to begin my next chapter. I knew my character was driving aimlessly, because that’s what she always does when she’s emotionally confused (which means she spends about 90% of the book in her truck). But how to describe the landscape I’ve already described, albeit in loving detail, ad nauseam? At that moment I passed a gun shop whose sign out front read: GLOCK SALE! Bingo. I came home and wrote the first page in 10 minutes. (Disclaimer: I live in Texas. You may have to seek out your own distinctive geographical sources of inspiration.)
5. Rewards are important. I’m not just talking about the reward of a day’s work done. I’m talking about ice cream. Nestle’s chocolate-dipped Vanilla Fudge cones, to be specific.
6. It can help to lower your standards. Not only does the pressure ease up considerably when you realize that you’re not in contention for the Pulitzer Prize, but the process becomes a lot more enjoyable.
7. The theory goes that it takes 30 days to break, or make, a habit. But I think our psyches are smarter than that. When we set a goal, then began to take small, successive steps toward that goal, a switch in our brains get flipped. The endorphins start flowing and we feel better about ourselves in general and our work in particular, which makes it that much easier to keep going.
8. Writing is alchemy; we’re spinning pure imagination into something tangible, for others to share or for our own enjoyment. While it can be hard, it can also, occasionally, be thrilling. Quite honestly, I’d forgotten that.
9. We’re not alone. On any given day, thousands of us are toiling at this task together. Is it nobility, or insanity, or both? However you look at it, communal is better if that, for no other reason, misery loves company.
10. Keep it up, and you may actually find that your muse is waking you at two in the morning, the way she used to. If that happens, get out of bed and let her in. Give her what she wants. It might be an hour at the computer, or a chunk of your soul. Or it might just be ice cream.
Beautiful, inspiring post. Thanks!
What a nice reminder that writing can occasionally be fun, if not spiritually uplifting. If it takes a hamster-wheel gimmick like NaNo to get us back in the groove, so be it.
GLOCK SALE. Scary.
Stick with Smith & Wesson. American-made.
Lovely post, Marsha. The one that particularly resonates with me is #6, lowering the standards. Watching the steady increase in wordcount on that bar graph in my NaNo profile helps me to remember I have to produce quantity first and quality will come later.
number 8. “when i feel this crazy, only magic will help,” she whispered to herself as she opened the last drawer in search of her wand. when she spied the glittering traces of fairy dust under the old gypsy’s scarf, she knew her seach was closing in on success. “abra cadabra!”
Good point, Red. Smith & Wesson is a lot more appropriate to my story, too. Anyway, it was just an example of outside inspiration; I didn’t intend to interpret it literally.
Actually, what it reminded me of was a place that sits right off Highway 79 in NE Texas that’s a combination hair salon/sattelite dish outlet. I always wanted to use that, so I just decided to make it a hair salon/gun shop.
How are things in Blanco County? You and Billy Don must be busy now that deer season’s opened. Oh, yeah, I forgot–you guys don’t pay much attention to silly things like the law, do you?
At the risk of spoiling a good joke, I feel compelled to reveal that Red O’Brien is really my friend Ben Rehder, an excellent unboxed writer himself. Ben’s the author of a series of comic mystery novels set in Blanco County, TX: Buck Fever, Bone Dry, Flat Crazy, Guilt Trip, and the forthcoming Gun Shy and Holy Moly (St. Martin’s Minotaur). Red does know his guns!
Comic mystery novels sound interesting…almost as interesting as a salon/gun shop. I’d be a little nervous my client might not like her dye job, go next door and return with a crazed look in her eye.
Now there’s an idea . . .
Great post, I also wrote today about what I have learned from NaNoWriMo, though your post was much better. I really enjoyed it.
Marsha, thank you so much for your post. I haven’t worked on my novel for a few days now (I’m in the editing stage) and I’m really missing it. No wonder I feel a bit blue today.
P.S. - I really prefer Ben and Jerry’s Lowfat chocolate brownie fudge yogurt.
Too bad the new “lifestyle change” i.e. diet won’t let me have it anymore!
People worry about quality over quantity, but quality is often an issue of the exploration/editorial/rewriting stage. You get quantity from the first stage, the generative stage… where you just toss out lots and lots of ideas and pull them together. Then, when you’ve done that, you can step back and take a look at what works and what doesn’t.
NaNo is a great reminder to just generate, generate, generate. National Novel WRITING Month… not Editing Month, or Rewriting Month. You can do that the rest of the year.