Why I Failed At NaNoWriMo

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

I am going to start this post by stating the obvious: I FAILED AT NANOWRIMO!!!!!
I don't know why. I was doing fine the first week, then splat, my hopes of finishing that novel, or even making a dent, just disappeared.  

The first day of NaNoWriMo I was doing fabulous. I wrote 4,000 words that first day. I didn't know I could do that. Better yet, I wrote those 4,000 words in about 1 and half to 2 hours. I find that impressive. On the second day, I wrote 2,000 words. Not nearly as impressive as the first day, but still  pretty good. I was way ahead of my word count. On the third day, I wrote 2,000 words. The fourth day I wrote 1,250 words.  On the fifth day, I wrote a thousand words.  I was on fire!

Then I went to camp for a week and didn't write at all. I was about ten thousand words behind. I could have caught up. I could have written four thousand words a day.  Spoiler Alert: I didn't. I wasn't feeling it.  I was just out of it. I just wanted to enjoy my summer.  I wanted to read all day.  

For me, Camp NaNoWriMo wasn't about writing fifty thousand words of a novel in one month. Let's be honest, fifty thousand words doesn't make the kind of novel I want to write. I want to write something that is not super lengthy, but normal sized.  NaNoWriMo was about self discovery for me. I discovered that I could write four thousand words in a day, and about ten thousand in four days.  That was HUGE for me. I am now researching for another idea.  I am not going to write four thousand words a day, for it is in the middle of the school year. I am going to write and I won't separate contractions.  I am not going to be so super concerned about that word count. I am going to write quality. I might try NaNoWriMo again, but only when I want to just get words onto paper. 

Concluding, I may not have been a "winner" this July, but I know that I did win something. I won a HUGE realization in my writing life. I can write more words quicker than I ever imagined. I am a "Winner" in my eyes. Thanks, Camp NaNoWriMo. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How Does Unique Formatting in Books Affect Your Reading Experience?

Image
How does the formatting of a book affect your reading experience? I usually enjoy unique formatting in my books, but I recently read the first half of Illuminae before putting it down. I quit reading Illuminae because of the formatting. While the whole book being composed of lab reports, wikipedia articles, and IM messages was a cool concept, it made the story hard to follow. Many people enjoyed Illuminae because of the unique formatting, and others enjoyed it because they thought it had a good story. The formatting, for me made the story drag and I had no idea what was going on until about page 150. The only part I enjoyed was the interviews with some of our characters because it was only then that you really got to see the characters. I enjoy both books that have unique formatting and books that have traditional formatting. However, I think that if a book does have unique formatting, the formatting should add to the story, not take away from the story. When I was reading I
Read more

Thoughts on The Wrath and the Dawn

Image
The Wrath and the Dawn  By: Renee Ahdieh  ★★★★.75 95% 388 pages Blurb In a land ruled by a murderous boy-king, each dawn brings heartache to a new family. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, is a monster. Each night he takes a new bride only to have a silk cord wrapped around her throat come morning. When sixteen-year-old Shahrzad's dearest friend falls victim to Khalid, Shahrzad vows vengeance and volunteers to be his next bride. Shahrzad is determined not only to stay alive, but to end the caliph's reign of terror once and for all. Night after night, Shahrzad beguiles Khalid, weaving stories that enchant, ensuring her survival, though she knows each dawn could be her last. But something she never expected begins to happen: Khalid is nothing like what she'd imagined him to be. This monster is a boy with a tormented heart. Incredibly, Shahrzad finds herself falling in love. How is this possible? It's an unforgivable betrayal. Still, Sh
Read more

Finding your groove with journaling

Image
When I was younger, I kept a journal, but it was mostly just what I did that day, or anything I was looking forward to in the future. I have recently gotten back into journaling, but I am doing it a lot differently than I used to.  Before you start to journal, you need to figure out how you want to do it and then get the supplies to do so. If you're not sure what kind of journaling you want to do, I would recommend experimenting. If you are going to experiment for a while before you see what you like the best, I would recommend getting a thick and tall notebook. Once you figure out what kind of journaling you want to do (i.e. prayer journaling, bullet journaling, art journaling, collage journaling, workout journal, or just idea journaling), go out and buy a journal that you both like and would work for what you want to do. The only real guidelines I use when picking out a new journal is to get a tall journal if you are going to do collage or art journaling. If you are do
Read more