NaNoWriMo: Y/N?

National Novel Writing Month has been a thing since 1999, growing organically from a small group of friends in one town to a huge non-profit spanning the globe. The whole story can be found here, and the official website can tell you anything you want to know about what it is and how to get involved. I'm here to discuss why I join the challenge most years, and why I sometimes don't.

It's a Challenge, Not a Contest

One of the things I like best about NaNoWriMo is that it encourages writers to see each other as companions, not competitors. It doesn't matter how many people reach their target, or how quickly they do it. The only metric of success is: "Did I reach my goal?" Not being the fastest, or the furthest, or the most published, or the more popular. It's a personal challenge that you work on in company with other writers.

This is an important point for writers, especially fiction writers, to take on board: We're not competing with other writers in our genres.  If someone enjoys my book, and I enjoy your book, then I'm going to send my readers to you and (I hope) vice-versa. The reader gets more to enjoy, and the writers get to grow and share their audience. NaNoWriMo is a good way of promoting that mindset, and reminding ourselves that we are storytellers first and foremost.

It's Still a Numbers Game, Though

As I'll be discussing in a couple of days, raw numbers aren't always the best way to measure success. I'm still discovering the needs of my AuDHD brain, but one possibility is that numbered goals can be a source of stress rather than motivation. Last November I didn't get anywhere near my 50k goal, but I did manage to write something every day for 30 days straight. And that felt like a real achievement!

I normally resist "streak" thinking, because it only takes one bad day to ruin months of work. So a workable metric for me is to set myself a target percentage, rather than counting unbroken streaks. Missing three days in a month is a 90% success rate. Missing 36 days across a year is a better than 90% success rate, even though that's more than five weeks' worth of missed days.

 Most productivity and self-study guides suggest that anything above 80% is a pass, and so that's my target. Anything over that 80% is a bonus, not the new baseline standard. 

So: NaNo yes or NaNo no? It depends entirely on how you like to write, and what you find motivating. Sometimes I'm in a "numbers" mood, and take pleasure in charting my progress. Other times, I simply get frustrated and blocked over how far behind I am. When I'm in that kind of headspace, I need to find a different motivator. But I do recommend checking it out. The community forums are amazing, and the pep talks are available in the archives. Take a look, use what you can, and don't force yourself into anything that isn't a good fit.

Actually, that's a pretty good rule for most advice now that I come to think about it.

Middles

Those of you following these posts live will have noticed that there is a gap in posting, which is in the process of being filled. (If you’re here on an archive crawl from the future, then please pretend that I was supremely organised and had everything queued up weeks in advance.) This “slump” is the curse of the middle: my constant companion in all projects, great and small.

Case in point: Act Two of The Avlem Burden is doing my head in. 

I know where the story is going. I know what the characters are doing. I know why, and how, and all the things, because I’ve procrastinated on the writing by overthinking every detail of this story. The only thing left to do is write the draft, and that’s exactly what I’m not doing. 

Why do you think I impulsively jumped into the A-Z challenge this year? To avoid working on TAB, of course!

And now this challenge is also a project, and has reached the middle, and is, of course, becoming a chore. I thought I might trick myself into writing TAB in order to avoid blogging, but that didn’t work. It’s hard to outsmart your own brain, especially on purpose.

I have two options now, as I see it. Well, three if you count “giving up” but I’m not going to so that’s out and we’re back to two. 

1. I could summon up all of my (meagre) willpower and make myself sit down and write.
2. I could step back and remind myself why I want to write, and where I’m going with all these words. 

Willpower on its own simply doesn’t work for me. I know it works for some people, and I watch in amazement as they show up day after day no matter their mood out of sheer determination. 

I am not filled with determination. I am filled with procrastination. 

But option two doesn’t work on its own, either. I can think about how much the Fragments cycle means to me, and why the A-Z challenge is so much fun — think and think and think! It ramps up my desire to finish, but does nothing to move me forward. 

Engaging the gears is useless without also pressing the accelerator.

Pressing the accelerator is useless without also engaging the gears. 

I need both drive and determination if I’m going to get through this murky middle and catch up with my goals on the other side. Drive, determination, and a little help from my friends. 

Thank you to everyone who’s commented so far. I will be returning the favour ASAP. Meanwhile, I’ll be over here, catching up on my work and trying to avoid stalling. 

 Again.

Light Verse

April is the cruellest, um, I mean poetry month. The internet is breaking out in ballads, getting drenched in doggerel, and lighting up with light verse.

Light verse is often set in opposition to “serious” poetry, an insubstantial bit of froth compared to the deep, intellectual, and meaningful efforts of Real Poets™.

“The interesting thing is that you don’t often meet a poet who doesn’t have a sense of humour, and some of them do keep it out of their poems because they’re afraid of being seen as light versifiers.” — Wendy Cope

The finest celebration of light verse I’ve read lately is Diary of a Somebody by Brian Bilston. This delightful slice-of-life mystery comic thriller holds a whole year’s worth of poetry which, in the words Bilston’s hated rival, Toby Salt, “lacks gravitas and soul”. But not even Salt could claim that Brian Bilston’s work lacks heart. 

The book makes a lot of references, and there is a helpful list in the back in case you don’t recognise anything. The jokes are funnier if you spot the references, but I think most of them stand up quite well just on their own (well, maybe not 27th June).

Where is Toby Salt? Who is Liz interested in? What terrible secret is hiding in the shed? Will the man at No. 29 ever put his bins out correctly? All this, and plenty of light verse, in Diary of a Somebody.

Lesson: Don't let fear of ridicule stifle your voice. 

Kindness

Content Warning

This post is the third and last on the theme of sensitivity and offence – deliberate or otherwise. Everything will be from my perspective, and the views expressed are not intended as guidance of any kind.

If this is a delicate subject for you, please skip forward to tomorrow’s topic: Light Verse. Thank you.

Justification

Content Warning

This post and the next are continuing the theme of sensitivity and offence – deliberate or otherwise. Everything will be from my perspective, and the views expressed are not intended as guidance of any kind.

If this is a delicate subject for you, please skip forward to Light Verse. Thank you.

Intent and Injury

 

Content Warning

These next three posts are going to be about the minefield that is sensitivity and offence – deliberate or otherwise. Everything will be from my perspective, and the views expressed are not intended as guidance of any kind.

If this is a delicate subject for you, please skip forward to Light Verse. Thank you.

How Do You Say...?

 

I try to be light on the personal details in this blog, but it's not giving away any secrets to reveal that I've recently moved (back) to Wales. Despite having family there, and thinking of it as "home away from home" for most of my life, I've never managed to get to grips with the Welsh language. Well, now I'm trying again.

Being a language learner who is first-language English is a mixed blessing in this information age. Resources are plentiful, and it's easy to find other learners, but the sheer ubiquity of English means that most Welsh speakers can speak and understand English. And so, when I begin to struggle, they switch to my language out of a desire to be polite and/or speed the conversation along a bit. 

This makes me self-conscious about making mistakes, hesitating, or even looking confused. And because I'm self-conscious, I make more mistakes, hesitate more, and spend most interactions looking (and feeling) confused; not to mention more than a little stupid.

But why? I don't think that other people are stupid, slow, or annoying if they don't speak perfect English. And I'm confident enough in BSL (British Sign Language) even though I know that I still make mistakes. There are probably lots of reasons, but I think that part of it could be about immersion. 

When someone struggles with English, and I can't speak their first language, we have no choice but to keep going. With BSL, switching to English takes more effort than sticking to sign. But with Welsh, it's quicker and easier to use English when the I can't think of a word. 

Having the "easy out" of using English, I don't try to rephrase my sentences or get creative with descriptors – I just say the word in English. And once the conversation is in English, that tends to be where it stays. 😕

Lesson Eight

It's OK to make mistakes. Say something instead of awkward silence. And remember how to say, "Please speak Welsh to me, I want to learn."