[From the Archive] Slow and Steady – Goal Setting
From 2009, and something I need to get back to…
“Slow and Steady”. Wow, with NaNoMo coming up, that sounds contradictory to what a lot of people are saying. Now, for those catching up – NaNoMo is the shortened version of National Novel Writing month. The purpose behind NaNoMo is to get people motivated to write that novel that everyone means to write “one day”. November makes it “that day”. It’s intended to get people to get words on paper. To get over the fear of writing crap. And to set a goal.
As a motivational tool, I can see that. As a practice, I’m finding myself agreeing more with Jennifer Blanchard over on Procrastinating Writers. She wrote in July her argument against NaNoMo as she was partnering with Holly Lisle in a different idea. Which is writing smaller word counts on a consistent basis. This is backed up by anecdotal evidence of Ernest Hemmingway which I found on Evelyn Alfred’s blog. Their idea – write 250 to 500 words 5 days a week.
Here’s the argument. NaNoMo – though awesome and inspiring – does get you over the “okay to write crap” barrier. When you’re doing that many words a day, you have to be able to do that. However, by working that fast – unless you’re used to it or under deadline – will not produce 1) a full-length novel – unless you’re writing Young Adult, or 2) give you a publishable manuscript. NaNoMo is like a lot of diet programs – really good at getting your weight OFF but doesn’t teach your to KEEP it off. If you have a project, great – use NaNoMo to jumpstart your writing “metabolism”. However, for long-term goals… I agree with the smaller, steadier word counts.
Writing is also like a marathon. You have to start small and work your way up. So starting with writing 250 to 500 words a day makes the first steps of that long-haul run novel project more manageable. I talked to a good friend last week about this. She has all these snippets and plot bunnies in her brain. She doesn’t know if they’re one novel or several or short stories, and NaNoMo daunts her. So I mentioned starting out writing 250 words a day. Get the scenes and snippets out of her head and on paper – then see which ones can be strung together. Her first reaction, “I can do that!” Of course you can. 250 words is a traditional typed page. And it’s not daunting.
What writing like this does is get you in a habit. It’s turning the water up under the pot of frogs. Before you know it, you’re writing something every day. If you commit to 5 days a week – you have two days a week to “blow”. You can fall off the wagon for two days a week and still not mess up your program. It also gives you a “weekend” to relax and let your brain recharge.
What you accomplish is a full-novel amount of words in a year. Then, as you get more comfortable with the process, you’ll find you do more words because your scene or thought isn’t finished, and you don’t want to stop. It lets you train yourself to be consistent and constant. And you’ll probably find the pressure off to do a LOT quickly. That’s what editors and deadlines are for.
I’ve mentioned that I’ve been looking to be more consistent with my own writing. Even established authors stumble with this. As of Monday, I committed to myself to write 250 NEW words – new fiction words – a day. I’ve not messed that up yet – but I’m only three days in. 😎 That gives me not only fresh material, but time to spend editing, doing blogs, writing these articles (yes, I still have 250 words to do after this today). But it’s something I can do at lunch or over morning coffee, or something, and then I have this great sense of accomplishment.
Will you join me? Let’s make NaNoMo not just about doing a novel in a month, but the start to new habits. Then we, too, can take it slow and steady and win the race.