Episode 77: NaNoWriMo in progress

Janine and Shannon are participating in National Novel Writing Month, in which we’re trying to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. In this episode, we thought we’d update you about how this fun adventure is going and what a wonderful time we’re having embracing imperfection.

Discussion topics include:

• How great it feels to get our writing goal accomplished first thing in the morning
• What a lesson in embracing imperfection NaNoWriMo has been
• The “bad-off” Shannon did with a fellow one-month novelist sharing examples of how bad their novel writing has been
• That it would be impossible to write a perfect in a novel in a month, so the goal is just about getting the words done
• The first rule of NaNoWriMo: You don’t talk about you’re writing about
• The liberation of knowing that no one will read the book in its first draft
• The challenge of not being about to remember what was written the day before, even with daily writing
• A key to succeeding at this challenge (or any challenge): prioritizing it
• How NaNoWriMo has helped Shannon with her cartooning homework
• Strategies for keeping up with NaNoWriMo when traveling
• How the lessons from NaNoWriMo can be applied to so many things (virtually anything!)
• Shannon’s joy in engaging in a challenge that approaches the edge of what she thinks she can do
• Janine’s love of tapping into her creativity by writing a novel in a month

Links:

• NaNoWriMo, in case you want to join it mid month
• Janine’s blog post about NaNoWriMo
• The Getting to Good Enough Facebook group where NaNoWriMo participants are encouraging one another