Winding Down

I know a lot of my readers here are NaNoWriMo participants, so this one's for you.

The last couple of days are where things get a little bit crazy. Many people are already finished, but the vast majority of people are still scrambling to get done. You don't hear as much from the latter, though, because they're too busy trying to write! So those of us who have finished early are the only ones here to give advice to the people who aren't done, even though we aren't experiencing the same thing.

Yesterday I considered making a blog entry about my plans for after November, plans which I've actually already gotten started on just a little. But I didn't do it, because if you're not done with NaNoWriMo yet then thinking about life after November is the last thing you need to do. (By done, it may mean getting to 50,000 or finishing your novel or just writing all the way up to the end. At this point you ought to be able to tell what done looks like for you, and it doesn't have to be the same as anyone else's!)

When you get close to the end it's easy to fall into. You think, "Finally! I'm almost done! Soon I'll be able to do all the things I've been putting off, reward myself, and everything!" This is the point where NaNoWriMo is actually harder for people who do a lot of writing, because we can't help but think about the next project. But I think everyone kind of has that thing that they want to do once they finish and open up a large block of free time.

But if you're not done, as I mentioned above, then that free time isn't open yet. And I guarantee once you get that time, you'll have plenty of chances to relax and have all of those thoughts. The key to finishing now is to live in the moment. The memes don't say "December is coming," because that's not what's happening. You are in one of the last days in November, and that's just how it is. Nothing can happen after that unless you do your best right now.

Good luck to everyone playing catch-up, especially my buddy Duth Olec, who's racing to get 10,000 words out of the last couple of days here!