Why do NaNoWriMo? NaNoWriMo Day 4

It’s a new moon today. A time for listening within. A time for setting intentions. It has been making me think a lot about my whys. Why do NaNoWriMo? Why write? What exactly am I hoping to accomplish?

As the days get shorter and my energy wanes, it seems a herculean task to expect myself to write more than I do at any other time of year. Especially as the to-dos pile up with the holidays and the end of the year.

And yet…

I still do NaNoWriMo. Even after losing the first six times, like a glutton for pain and disappointment, I still wanted to do it. Why?

Why do NaNoWriMo?

I have heard people give a lot of reasons about why they do NaNo.

1. Camaraderie. If you ask a WriMo why they do it, so many will answer that it’s the camaraderie. And the community of it is huge. There are tons of authortubers who take part. Facebook and Instagram are covered in it. There are groups for local participants, groups for participants in different genres. You can go around the world on discord or write for 100 hours straight on youtube. Even as an introvert, you feel like you are part of something larger.

2. The Challenge. Sometimes you just need something to kick you into overdrive. I love a challenge (see my posts on writing challenges and submission bonanzas) and I think of NaNoWriMo as a dare. Who said I couldn’t finish a novel in a month? I’ll show them! 

3. Taking yourself more seriously. You can’t sit around waiting for inspiration to strike when you are on a deadline like this, even if it is self-imposed. You just need to get your butt in the chair and do the best work you know how to do. Get down to business.

4. Taking yourself less seriously. This is maybe counterintuitive, to take on a big challenge like this to take yourself less seriously, but hear me out. You cannot be precious about your words and your work when you are trying to write a novel in a month. 

5. Finally finishing something. While I think most winners of NaNoWriMo come out on December 1st with a completely ready-to-go book, I do think the premise requires you to stick with one project. You can’t follow your shiny object syndrome and finish a novel in a month. And then, once you are 50,000 words in, you might as well just finish. 

Why do I do NaNoWriMo?

We all have very different reasons for coming to the page, and NaNoWriMo is no exception. For me personally, it is about building my consistency as a writer. I have been writing stories since I could write, and yet it has never been consistent. My writing always seemed best when it was bursting out of me, and I just had to wait for that to come. I could sit down and vomit up something in 15 minutes that would be beautiful or sit down and work for hours on something that was crap. I felt like my writing, my muse, my creativity was not something I could control myself.

But I am working on developing a different relationship with my writing. I am learning to create the space for the writing to come, to allow it even in the quiet times, to listen for it even when I am not inspired. And NaNoWriMo helps me build that muscle. The camaraderie and the challenge and the feeling of accomplishment are awesome. But for me, the biggest gain is the exercise, the practice, the slow and steady development of my ability to sit down each day and create. 

What’s your why?

Here’s my update

Progress:

Day 3 Word Count: 1089

Total Word Count: 5169

This puts me just a little bit behind where I had hoped to be today. But also, just this much is more than I wrote in all of October, and on track according to the 1667 words everyday math. So I am happy with that, but I am going to have to put in extra work today if I want to take give myself a break on Friday!