December is Here

Finally. After about the third week of November I was sick of NaNoWriMo. That's a really sad thing to be feeling, sick of the novel writing month that I look forward to every year.

This year has been a disaster, though. I never got past 8k on any story I started, and I changed at least ten times. I just haven't been as dedicated to my writing lately. I've struggled to finish anything, and I've started to wonder if I'll ever be able to get published. It's really depressing.

I did manage to finish NaNoWriMo, though I didn't finish a novel. I found that the biggest reason I'm having trouble with it the past two years is I've been taking it too seriously. I've been using it as a way to get my publishable ideas written, and that's not what NaNoWriMo is about. It's about having fun writing something crappy. I may not ever do NaNoWriMo again because I can't write something crappy. Even when I banish my inner editor, I still physically can't write anything bad. It makes me sick just thinking about writing something like that.

So, since it is now December and I have up to five months before I leave for Texas, I've decided to try a different approach to writing. I've been focusing on writing novels (and once I have one idea than it turns into a whole series, which usually overwhelms me to the point I don't want to do it anymore) and what I need to be focusing on is getting SOMETHING published. Meaning, I should start at the bottom and write short stories for magazines and anthologies and get a foot in the door before I try to write a novel.

And I think I can actually do it. I have proven to myself already that I can write short stuff (even when I was trying to write long stuff) so now it's just a matter of writing one thing and finding someone who will publish it. All things considered, that shouldn't be excruciatingly hard, but we'll see how it turns out.