Four Ways to Prepare Your Life for NaNoWriMo

It’s October, meaning we’ve officially entered NaNoWriMo prep month! I will be participating under the name temproaryworlds, so feel free to add me as a buddy if you’d like.

2018 marks my eighth year doing NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, where people all around the world vow to write an entire novel (or at least 50,000 words of it) in the month of November. I have won NaNoWriMo every year that I’ve participated, and have, over time created a few habits to help me prepare. Next week, I’ll be sharing how I prep my novel. Today, I’m going to talk about how I get my life in order for optimum chances of success.

Pick a Time to Write– Ideally, this is going to be the same time ever day. If it can’t be, because sometimes schedules are complicated, then try to make it as consistent as possible. Regardless of how you spin it, it’s best to know when you’re writing time is going to be every day, in advance.

The reason behind this? If you just say that you’re going to get those 1,667 words down “sometime today” without planning in advance, it’s a lot easier to procrastinate, or outright forget to do it. Also, this allows you to give your loved ones a heads up, rather than springing it on them at the last moment. This makes it a lot easier for them to respect your writing time.

As for me, I’ll be writing in the morning before work. I know from the past that I need to set aside a solid hour for writing, which (after a few days) will allow me to get roughly 1800 words down. As you can see, I tend to write at a pretty steady clip. Other people may need to schedule in more time. On the weekends, I’ll still be writing in the AM, but do my best to find a little extra time (anywhere from fifteen minutes to a full hour) to allow me to get ahead.

Plan Your Schedule in Advance– Sometime In the first week of October, I will sit down and write out all of my responsibilities through the end of November. This includes Thanksgivings, appointments (it’s about time to hit up the dentist, and the vet), and other predictable responsibilities, such as Christmas shopping. I try and see how many of these responsibilities I can move to October, if possible. Pushing them back a month isn’t usually an option, because the books I write are closer to 100k rather than the standard 50k, so I I’m probably going to run into December.

In doing this, it helps me predict potential problems. For example, I usually go to two Thanksgivings dinners, and this always involves a bit of travel. Does this mean that I’ll have to get up earlier that day to get my writing in? Election day is coming up. Can I save time by voting absentee?

When it comes to scheduling in 50,000 words worth of writing, the main issue for me is less about logistics and more about the mental load. Drafting a new novel can be an exhausting experience, and having to worry about when I can schedule in this or that can ad a lot of stress. Planning out your shit in advance helps to ease that load.

Clean Your House- Welcome to the least glamourous step! Now I’m not saying that you have to scrub the top of your ceiling fans, but when your mind is scrambling for reasons to procrastinate, that pile of stuff on the floor is going to look awfully tempting. Unfortunately, there’s no way to stop dishes from accumulating, and laundry from needing to be folded, but if you can start out in a good place, you’re less likely to find your attention pulled elsewhere. If you can offload some of that housework on other parties, that’s great! But let’s be honest, that’s not realistic for most people. So since I can’t bribe my cats to take care of my floors, we settled for buying a robot vacuum.

Tell People- Okay, I’m not saying that you need to announce that you’re writing a novel to all of your neighbors, but telling those nearest and dearest to you does have it’s benefits. And I say this as someone who’s not hugely share-y about my writing when it comes to people IRL.

For one thing, you have people that can hold you to your word (even if they only ask “how’s that novel going?”). If the people you tell are fellow writers who are participating in NaNo, you can bond or provide to support to each other during the process.

In addition, this is also a good time to let people know that you may not be as readily available as you normally are. You’re probably not going to answer those text message as instantly. You may not be able to drop everything for family and friends if they’re in the habit of showing up at your door, wanting to hang out (FYI- never do this to me. I don’t improvise well).

Writing 50,000 words in one month may sound like an unclimbable mountain, especially during November, which is a busy time of the year for most Americans. But over the years, I’ve found that if I make the effort to stack the odds in my favor in advance, I have been able to find the time and the energy necessary to surpass that word count goal.

So that’s how I prepare my life for NaNoWriMo. Next week I’ll be taking about how I prepare my manuscript, so come back around for that!