While I have continued to check in daily and write something toward Undead, there were a lot of days last week that had me falling further and further behind. On Friday I managed to get back to “par” by writing 2400 words and then Sunday was pretty much the opposite as I wrote only 125 words while trying to sort out how to weave together the various plot threads I’ve left dangling.
I told myself that today I would put some time toward plotting those characters’ story arcs so that I could weave them all together, but instead so far all I’ve done is I get caught up on Doctor Who and play Packrat (an online game to which I am quite addicted). I did get some productive procrastination done, though, starting to sort through my inventory for the Libraries craft fair next week. Nothing new, yet…. though I am brewing some ideas there, too.
No, the past week for NaNoWriMo has been a combination of my assuring myself that I can do this and telling myself I am an idiot, wasting time on this pursuit that will only create crap. At which point I generally remind myself that Stephanie Meyer made an awful lot of money on crap, and then E.L. James remixed that crap, making worse crap, and more money again. Such are the things authors tell themselves in order to keep going.
This week, I must write. I will not get THIS close and not finish. In order to finish “on time” I need to write 1855 words per day but I really hope to finish before then…. so 2k minimum per day. No excuses.
I’ve gotten into the habit of selecting a rune on Sunday evenings to use as a focus for the week (remember how I made “focus” my word of the year for 2015?) and last night I pulled TIW from the bowl. TIW represents the war god and the forces necessary to bring about change. Interpretations can range from taking action to inviting change. It asks you to draw on your courage to face that change, and to delay at your peril. I’m taking that to heart this week as I face a few personal demons, among them my tendency to self-sabotage as I near the end of a project.
Don’t ever let anyone tell you that writing a novel is simple; it is equal parts exhausting, exhilarating and frustrating. Every writer differs in their approach but Hemingway put it best when he said, “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.“