There’s a new challenge coming up in November for writers to consider taking on. It’s called “NaNoWriMo“, National Novel Writing Month.
What is it exactly? It’s a “competition” to try and write a 50k word novel during the month of November. Sound crazy and over-whelming? Well, you’re probably right, and many of the writers signed up for the event all over the world might openly agree with you!
“What’s the prize?” you may be asking? The prize is that you complete the challenge. You get a digital web badge that you can show off on your blog.
“What?! That’s it?” you’re wondering? Yes. That’s it.
If the goal of the sheer act of competing in NaNoWriMo for the sake of trying to hit a 50k word goal isn’t enough “goal” for you, than this simply isn’t the kind of competition meant for you.
Too busy? Life is too crazy right now? Got a full time job and family? etc? etc? Those aren’t excuses for not trying the competition; they’re stories put in place to convince yourself why it’s not worth failing, because you just know it’ll be impossible to hit the final goal–and therefore you’ll “lose”.
NaNoWriMo is about more than “winning” or “losing” and I’ve created a list below of ten reasons that I’ve contemplated for why I’ll take on this challenge. These reasons might work for any apprehensive writer out there. I, like many of you, also came up with the excuses mentioned above and more. This is my counter-list, and ultimately, the one that wins out considering the most important satisfaction of taking the challenge for me is simply for the experience of trying.
10 Reasons to Try NaNoWriMo
- Writing a Novel: Ever want to write a novel, but never had the time? Here’s your time! One month: November. It’s a limited time window to think of nothing but achieving your goal. The rest of the year you can go ahead back to the routine of life.
- Taking a Challenge: Challenges are healthy. They keep the mind active and going in creative directions that it might never have gone in considering the new pressures involved.
- Being Creative: Sometimes writers hit that dreaded “writer’s block”. During NaNoWriMo, there really is no time to deal with these blocks. This challenge helps you gain confidence in defeating those blocks, ignoring them, or smashing through them with resilience.
- Excitement: Who doesn’t get excited when completing benchmarks in life, or work, or even video games? Make 5k word goals for yourself if 50k seems unattainable. Be excited about “clearing the level” then pump yourself up to move on to the next level, get yourself anxious to defeat the next end boss!
- Community: NaNoWriMo is not only a competition, but a community of like-minded people. There can’t be a better support group than these writers for getting help, guidance, support and encouragement for you to meet your goals.
- Escapism: After dealing with the responsibilities in life, find that moment in time for a sit-down with your NaNoWriMo story and grind through it. Get lost in a fictional world outside the real one, let the mind flow and embrace the fact that in your fictional world you make all the decisions!
- Time Management: You want to get a hard lesson in time management? Take this challenge. There’s nothing like adding a 50k word novel to your life, done in one month, to get your time management skills really refined!
- Testing Ground: Have ideas that you never have time to explore or put into motion? Here’s your chance to at least start it! At the very least you can create a free-flowing brain dump rough fiction novel as a framework for later. If you never do anything with it later: Who cares! At least you got the thoughts out and it’s made room for new thoughts or pushed you towards “the next step” of refining your product into something more complete later. That choice is up to you.
- Role Play: Ever wonder what it might be like to be a real novelist? Someone who’s main goal in life is to be published? Here’s your chance to role play the life they live, the sacrifices they make, the challenges they have to defeat, and hopefully, the thrill they get out of the process of it all.
- Fun Of Course!: If you can’t see the fun of trying a challenge like this, then you’ve missed one of the most important benefits of NaNoWriMo. Even if you don’t make it to 50k, try to keep it fun all through November. Let NaNoWriMo remind you of a fun time when you accomplished an outlandish goal regardless of word count, or digital web badges. Just remember the fun of it all!
