NaNoWriMo Week 4: “I’m sick of sittin’ ’round here trying to write this book.” -Bruce Springsteen

“Stop looking at the mountain of words you’ve yet to write. You climb even the steepest path one step at a time and that’s how you’re going to reach your goal: word by word.” -Hillary DePiano

That quote above is from a pep talk I did for Camp NaNoWriMo (whole thing is here if you’re interested) and I want to follow it up with another little gem…

“Words with typos are still worms.” –Hillary DePiano

That little bon mot was the result of my typing too fast during a region vs region chat last week but I think, in its own way, it may be even more appropriate for this point in our NaNoWriMo journey.

Because, by this point in the month, things have gotten ugly. Your prose, your typing, your novel itself is probably somewhere from a bit of a mess to a total disaster. Things stopped making sense long ago. Your life is probably a little messy too since all those things you put off in the beginning of the month to get more writing time in are coming back to haunt you. Even if things are going perfectly, you can probably relate to the words of the great Bruce Springsteen, “I’m sick of sittin’ ’round here trying to write this book.”

But the end is in sight! In just one week, it will be December and, no matter how you feel now, trust me, you’ll miss this writing frenzy once the calendar page flips over so get as much writing in as you can now before the November pep party is over. The end is also in sight for your novel which is why you mustn’t stop now, even if you’re positive you can’t reach 50,000 in time. Believe it or not, you CAN still write the entire 50k in a week if you needed to. Never underestimate the power of the sprint. 

Even if you’ve finished your novel or passed 50,000 words, write towards the end of your story or start something new. The inspiration of NaNoWriMo only comes around once a year, might as well use it as an excuse for your own personal First Draft-a-Palooza. That’s my philosophy, anyway.

Whatever you do, don’t stop writing! You think you’re over November? I already put up my Christmas tree, THAT’s how over it I am. But I’m still writing…

Goonies never say die!

So use this Thanksgiving Weekend to power through and get some writing done, do matter what! Trust me, you’ll be thankful you did!