Today, I will do an exercise frequently employed by athletes: reviewing old statistics and figuring out how to improve my game. By "my game," I mean my NOVELING game. I haven't been a competitive athlete since eighth grade.
According to the stats on my NaNoWriMo profile, last year I completely gave up increasing my word count at 33,550 words on November 25th. According to NaNo's Word Count Algorithm, I was supposed to hit 41,667 words that day. Obviously, I didn't. I proceeded to not update my word count for the rest of the month, for a total of 16,450 words behind the target 50,000 words. According to the graph, the last day I was on track was November 11th, where I was 92 words ahead. From there, my word count went up, but it didn't increase at the necessary rate to write 50,000 words in 30 days. In other words, I wrote every day, but I did not write enough.
Looking back at the statistics for my biggest success, November 2011, I noticed something completely different. I finished the month 10,500 words over the target; the biggest disparity between the words I needed to write and the words that I had written came at the end of the month, over Thanksgiving break. My stats were not so impressive through the entire month - I seemed to have a rough beginning, for example. By November 11, however, I had logged over 23,000 words - almost 5,000 words over the target count. How were those two days different?
Part of it was the day of the week. November 11, 2011, was a Friday; in 2013, it was a Monday. In 2011, I was still in high school, and Veteran's Day gave me a three-day weekend. In 2013, I was in college, and Mondays that semester were my longest days. I could have let my homework slip a little until Tuesday morning to write a lot on Monday, but I decided not to.
One major contribution to my success in 2011, I think, was the 11 challenge. When you write out November 11, 2011 in numerals would have resulted in 11/11/11, so some Wrimos sent out some 11-related challenges: either to write for 11 hours or to try writing 11,111 words in a single day. I forced myself to sit down with some snacks, some pens, and a copy of the Complete Works of William Shakespeare (that year, all my characters were named after Shakespeare's) and write ALL DAY to hit whichever goal came first. I didn't achieve either goal, but I did write over 3,000 words, which got me well on my way to keeping my word count ahead of the minimum.
A third thing that helped me in 2011 that I didn't do in 2013 was to aim to write more than the minimum 1,667 words per day. I always go into NaNoWriMo with the intent to write 2,000 words per day to allow for a bit of a buffer in case an emergency arises and I can't hit the word count. In 2011, I took this very seriously; in 2013, I relied too much on my ability to write 2,000 words per day that I slacked off. Eventually, my word count got to the point where even 2,000 words a day would not save my word count by November 30th.
So what does all this mean for my word count in 2014?
Firstly, it means that I should do my best to write 2,000 words per day without exception. The only day I should go to bed early is the day I have written 2500 words. There are only four times when I shouldn't be writing: when I'm in an academic commitment (class, studying, etc), when I'm eating, when I'm showering, and when I'm sleeping. I should still eat more sandwiches and cut my showers short.
Additionally, I should take at least one day to commit to just writing. I plan to do that on November 25th. I know it's a bit late in the month to do that, but it's the best day I can come up with: I'll be home for Thanksgiving break, and it's early enough in the break where I can take a day to just write and still visit my boyfriend, go to volunteer gigs, see my old friends, do some homework, and hang out with family. I shouldn't let myself rely on that day; as I learned last year, relying on one big writing session to get my word count up is not going to make my novel 50,000 words long.
Next, I should reduce the distraction capacity to the ABSOLUTE MINIMUM. This includes deleting all games, blogging apps, and possibly social media apps off of my phone and computer. I should also store all books not related to class or writing in some hidden place, because those hold a lot of potential distraction. Yarn shall also be hidden for the same reason.
Third, gym time should not be cut, but it should be monitored. I should go to the gym as often as necessary; if I decide my workout time is 8:30-9:30, I should not be starting on the treadmill at 9:15. The only excuse for this behavior is if I get a brainwave for THE BEST PLOT TWIST EVER and, instead of changing into running shorts, I'm changing the course of my novel. Trying to find a good song while I am trying to put my running shorts on counts as procrastination and a generally bad idea.
Hopefully, publicly committing to this is going to help my chances of winning this year. I know I say that every year, but I mean it every year. I hope this works.
To all the Wrimos reading this, MAY THE WORDS BE EVER IN YOUR FAVOR.
AND ALSO THE MUSE.
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