I’m going to go ahead and say this again: I don’t NaNoWriMo.
This is the wrong time of year to put the pressure on.
You see, I’m one of those weirdos who has a family.
I’m currently designing children’s clothing and shopping for fabric, I’ve got Thanksgiving to plan out and execute, which will be shortly followed by preparing for Christmas … and Animal Crossing is a mere 3 days away from a major update. I don’t have the time or energy to write 50,000 words this month. Or next month.
Instead of trying to write a novel as fast as possible, I’m a huge advocate for creating sustainable writing habits all year long. It’s important to have the space to live and breathe as a person, as well as the time for ideas to fully mature before they’re set down into words.
Frankly, NaNoWriMo is another aspect of a Fast-Food culture where everyone wants instant gratification at the cost of quality. Let’s face it: people are going to churn out something derivative this month, then spend the next year flogging it to death on social media to extract out as much money as possible from mindless consumers. Rinse and repeat.
So go ahead and spend the next four weeks furiously rewriting someone else’s ideas — I’m perfectly aware that nothing is going to stop you.
By Autumn Rain 