What is it like to write over 50,000 words in less than a month? It's not quite as straightforward as baking bread, but the process is similar.
Before I got the result to the right, I experimented with different gluten-free flours and thickeners. I modified recipes based on past experiences to create my own nurtient-dense blend. Add some flax seed and a dab of maple syrup, and I came up with a hearty gluten-free bread brimming with nuts, seeds, and whole grain flours.
A story outline has different types of ingredients in its "recipe", but it still requires balance and "cook time." Once I got all the ingredients together, (characters, major plot points, rising and falling conflict) I hit the ground running on November 1st. By November 25th, I surpassed my writing goal, but I still had more story left.
Read on if you're curious about my 2023 NaNoWriMo experience.
To give a quick overview, NaNoWriMo is an anual writing challenge meant to encourage authors to pen a new 50k word novel in the month of November. This works out to be 1667 words per day. Authors create an account on the website and update their word count to reflect their progress toward their goal.
For the last three Novembers, I've completed the challenge. This year marks the fourth novel I may not have written without this extra creative push. My first project in 2020 was a personal work to reflect on family turbulence. The novel I completed in 2021 was a comedy based on a short story. I am in the process of editing it with hopes of pitching it to agents next year. In 2022, I wrote a women's fiction/comedy about the trials of being kid-free after age thirty.
Do I hope to publish all of these novels eventually? I'm not sure. One is a little too personal without serious modification, and another needs heavy editing. Either way, the progress I made as a writer and proving to myself several times that I can indeed write a first draft of a novel in a month made each of those journeys worth it. And in each story, I had to draw on past experiences: old friends, broken relationships, fading dreams, and my own personal, spiritual, and emotional growth.
Revisiting all those "younger me" events wasn't always a pleasant experience. Just like everyone else, I've accumulated my own various depths of pain and frustration along with joy and laughter. Unlike everyone else, I choose to acknowledge all my past gunk as part of me and seek to be a little more like Jesus every day. That means loving others when I want to lash out, when they mistreat me, and when they don't think they need (or I don't think they deserve) grace.
Especially when I don't think they deserve grace.
But I do it because God showed me grace in my lowest moments. I know I am no hero, but I'm not always a victim either. I hurt people, made (and still make) poor decisions, said damaging words I couldn't retract, and pushed people away. I had my heart broken, felt forgotten, less than, and turned my back on people who tried to be there for me.
In each of those cases, I learned, I grew, and I adapted. If Jesus is my model for how to love other people well, I have a lifetime of work to do. The goal is not perfection; it's to get a little better at acceptance, grace, and forgiveness every day—even forgiving myself when I backslide.
The person I am today couldn't exist without the trials I endured before. Though I often wish I could go back and rewrite parts of my own life story, I would throw the person I am now out of balance. Growth rarely happens inside comfort zones or when everything's going well. It can't happen at all if I believe I'm perfect and don't need to apologize or work on myself.
And if I claim to believe in a loving God who wants the best for all humans, I need to let him work through my weaknesses to transform me into someone new.
What does this have to do with writing? Everything. One of the most repeated pieces of writing advice is simply to "write what you know." What do I know? Regret, sympathy, exclusion, fear, heartbreak, joy, and every other experience in between. If I grew from all of them, I have an almost endless supply of experiences to pour into my novels.
Though my characters each have different life filters through which they view their worlds, I can walk them through similar pain and struggles. Their stories begin when they shift course, when they decide to try and stop damaging themselves with addictions, self-depracating thoughts, and excuses.
Just like new paths open up for me when I make changes to my life, I write their changes into their story as they seek personal growth.
This was my NaNo experience this year. I set out to write a more lighthearted comedy, but it got deeper than I meant. Each character has hidden reasons for why they behave, and I couldn't bob on the surface without wondering what else lurked in the depths. So I dragged each character down and explored.
While my first draft still has a little work to go, I'm almost done with my ninth full novel. After that, I'll let it sit until I can view my characters with fresh eyes. I do plan to add more humor later to balance the tension, but for now, I'm letting it all out. Whatever it looks like to me later, I'm proud of myself for getting where I am now.
Keep on smilin'!
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