How to Win NaNoWriMo When You Don’t Feel So Good

By Lisa Lanser Rose on November 1, 2023 • ( Leave a comment )

I first participated in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) in 2012, back when I was the faculty advisor to a creative writing club.

Now I have trouble sitting upright at a desk, especially when my keyboard is elevated.

I felt happily pressured to set an example for starry-eyed students and won.

(In NaNoWriMo, “winning” simply means you wrote and verified 50,000 words of an original draft through their website.)

I participated again in 2014 and won again–and still had the honor of leading that community of students. I was working full time, but I didn’t have chronic pain. I didn’t have fatigue.

During Nano 2018, 2019, and 2020, but failed two out of those three years, which makes sense. The two years I failed, I was trying to work with a pre-existing manuscript. This challenge works best for a first-draft blitz of 50,000 words, which is how it was originally intended. Plus, I also no longer worked at that school with those kids. Plus, I developed an autoimmune disease. It causes exhaustion and makes sitting for long periods difficult. And I was going it alone.

National Novel Writing Month, or “NaNoWriMo,” was founded in 1999 by Chris Baty and twenty-one San Francisco Bay Area participants. Although it’s called “National,” it was such a great idea, it became international the very next year.

The original ground rules were these:

The novel must be new. A first draft.
It can’t be co-authored.
It has to be submitted in time for your word count to be verified.

The rules have since relaxed, allowing local communities to set their own guidelines, but the 50,000 word count remains, and so does the camaraderie.

It’s a brilliant formula, apparently.

According to their website, last year 378,264 writers set goals and tracked them using their site tools, and 51,670 writers won.

This year I hope to win again. I’m on a new biological that helps, I’m getting more sunshine and exercise, and, although I wish I still had a local crew of fellow Wrimos, I’m trying to make online community work.

Misery and Creativity Love Company

For the past ten years I’ve had my close-knit online community in The Gloria Sirens as well as a monthly writers accountability group who meet by Zoom. None of them are Wrimos this year, but they keep me accountable, and if I fail, they’re great at commiserating. Friends make all the difference.

Sirens in Chicago 2023: L-R Suzannah Collins, me, Katie Riegel, Rose Peal, Suzanne Heagy.

Local writers: “pretend we’re arguing.” L-R Delaney Rose, Jeff Anderson, Nick DiChario, me.

It’s not lost on me that two of the three times I completed NaNoWriMo, I did it alongside those writing students. One spring The Gloria Sirens hosted a weeklong writing marathon during which I also set and hit a word count target. Camaraderie and accountability work marvels. That’s why this year for NaNoWriMo I’m working with Sisters in Crime.

Sisters in Crime (SinC) is the only writing organization of its kind, focused on equity and inclusion in the mystery writing community. SinC advocates for women and female-identifying working in the mystery genre.

A couple days ago they launched NaNoWriMo by offering their members a webinar called “Making NaNo Work When It Doesn’t?” Authors Claire Murray, Kelly Oliver, and Susan Nonnenmacher had all previously participated in NaNoWriMo and developed strategies that helped them win despite the challenges and health issues, such as chronic pain or an inability to focus, things that might, as the description put it, “make a crunch like NaNo feel impossible for whatever reason.”

What follows are a few notes I took, which is just a fraction of what you’ll get if you join SinC, which you totally should.

As we signed off, someone posted in the chat, “SinC membership is the best money you’ll ever spend!”

How they get it done:

Kelly Oliver is a Philosophy professor and bestselling author who writes 3 books a year, so if anybody knows how to crank it, she does. She writes when she can almost every day, a little bit. Has to make it consistent, every day. She said writing a book still feels daunting even to her, especially at the beginning. She trusts the process, that somehow she’ll get done despite challenges that sound very similar to mine.

Hers was my favorite line, “If you CAN do it, DO it, because you don’t know when you’ll be able.” Beautiful and true.

Oliver’s tips:

Get comfortable. She writes in a recliner and uses a lap desk. (I sit propped on a bed with a lap desk.)
Set aside one hour to focus solely on your writing, and you’ll be amazed how much you get done. Cut out all distractions and go!
Participate in write-ins. They’re excellent for the energy and camaraderie. They offer accountability, sharing, and community problem-solving. “The ticking clock makes you aware and focused. It’s a doable block of time.”
She reminds us that if you write a mere hour or two a day, you will accomplish amazing things. NaNoWriMo is 50,000 in one month, or 1,666 words a day. Producing only 6,000 words a month gives you a 72,000-word book a year. If you sign in with NaNoWriMo, you can do sprints with a buddy, or you can do it with friends.

I sit either leaning back on pillows or on this futon, typing on a lap desk.

Claire Murray always has multiple projects going at once. She writes short stories, has self-published her collection, and has an editor at a small press interested in her suspense-fantasy.

Murray always has multiple projects in multiple stages, stories, novellas, novels. Keeps three computers going at once, one for Zoom, and one for writing with Scrivener, and one for–I don’t remember. Wordle? One year she started NaNoWriMo with multiple projects in one Scrivener file. She opened blank text files for each and jumped back and forth.

Murray’s tips:

For visual thinkers, do a mind map to help you get started.
Some say don’t edit–Chris Baty, NaNoWriMo founder, even encourages people to pry off their delete keys! Murray says you can allow yourself editing and have deleted stuff count toward your word count by using strike-through instead of delete.
Incidentally, she and the other speakers recommend you never delete anything, and so do I. I keep files called “scraps,” (I’m also a Scrivener fan), because sometimes you realize the original was better after all, or sometimes you want to ransack an old file for a new project. You never know.

Susan Boreth Nonnemacher is a copywriter in marketing, but she also writes fiction. Like Oliver, she works on one project at a time. She starts with characters, outlines the first few chapters, and then takes it from there, when it takes on a life of its own..

Nonnemacher‘s tips:

Set a timer, especially if you have a bad back or arthritis, so you get up and move around.
Keep your goals flexible. “Give yourself the grace to do what you can, even if it’s less than you hoped.” Forgive yourself. It’s okay to admit, “It’s not my day to do that”
Ask for extensions at work.
Reschedule with family and friends. Tell them you’ll see them in December.
Make time to relax–that’s when you’re most creative.
Before you sit down to write, make sure you have all the tools you need, such as “speech-to-text,” a timer, wrist braces, or anything else that helps you stay focused and productive.
Join in write-ins and sprints. She usually gets 500-600 words written in a sprint and “can’t do without it.” Even when writing for work, she’ll jump into a write-in to get that first draft cranked.
If you have disabilities, ALWAYS PAD YOUR TIME–give yourself extra time whenever giving deadlines/promises. Especially do so this month, when you’re bearing the extra work of bringing the first draft of your new book into the world.

Other tips I gathered from this webinar and past writing crunches

Tell everyone you’re doing NaNoWriMo. Not only will it help you stay accountable, people in your orbit are more likely to give you the space you need to get it done.
When you can’t think of a word or you hit a moment where you need to do research, type XXXXX and move on. You’ll “do your X’s” when November’s done and you’ve won NaNoWriMo.
Plan ahead of time for catch-up days when you invariably get interrupted by the unexpected or your health. Put them on your calendar.
Use the speech-to-text feature. Practice with it ahead of time.
Plan for any health issues that might interfere with your goals. Be ready to reassess and re-center.
A Fitbit or smartwatch is your friend. Let it remind you to take so many steps an hour and hit stand goals, just like your word count goals.
Make sure you’re eating the foods that best support your health, drinking enough water, and getting enough sleep–prioritize these basics above all else.
Don’t skimp on your walks, workouts, or stretching routines just to meet your word count. It’s good to push yourself and make sacrifices for your art, but make them elsewhere–cut back on social media, gaming, or television, and ignore or postpone emails, messages, and phone calls from toxic people.
Let yourself count notes and outlines as part of your word count. (Is it cheating? Maybe? Guess what–you set the rules that work for you, as long as it’s progress toward a creative writing project and you produce 50,000 words!)

Remember you’ve accomplished big projects before!

Whatever you do, solicit the support of friends and loved ones who get psyched about your creativity. If you want a buddy, come find me on NaNoWriMo, I’m @lisalanserrose. I’m going to draft a science fiction novella.

NaNoWriMo not only keeps you inspired and accountable, they have post-November support on their “Now What?” page.

Join Sisters in Crime! They have all kinds of year-round support and a lot going on right now for NaNoWriMo, such as daily virtual write-ins and local meet-ups. They have a vast archive of webinars like the one I told you about free for members, and they have one in early December called “What to Do With My NaNo Mess?” You don’t want to miss that, because the first draft is just the beginning.