I'm Getting Excited

I'm getting pretty psyched about NaNoWriMo. I have an account with My Writing Nook and have the corresponding iPhone app. I'm eager to start but the official start date isn't until November 1. I have decided that even if it's mostly gibberish, I shall have a 50,000 word document by November 30.

I've started novels before, but I'm pretty sure none have ever made it quite to 50,000 words. I have high hopes this year, primarily because I have a writing partner, and she is my girlfriend. I imagine coming home in the evening and clicking away at our computers, cursing writer's block together and comparing word counts. I've just put a daily event on my Google calendar: "Write 1667 words."

I've thought about doing NaNoWriMo before, but the start date has come and gone without me remembering to start, or the lack of someone to commiserate/celebrate with has made it feel like a solitary struggle up a steep hill.

So I've been thinking about this for a couple of weeks now, and I have a plan for when I get stuck. My plan is to keep writing, even if I don't know what comes next. I figure it's a pretty smart plan: the babbling until something sensible comes out will add to my word count,for one thing, and the hours I spend will count toward my 10,000 hours to become an expert novelist.

I get the 10,000 hours concept from Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point, a really fascinating look at genius and a practical outline of what separates the Bill Gateses from the rest of us: time invested. Sure, they start off a little smarter than some, but not magnificently so. The key is to care so much about what you're interested in that you spend time--a lot of time--doing it.

I've worried that I inherently lack the kind of passion it takes to make that sort of commitment. Looking at it objectively, though, I don't think I lack passion. I think I care quite a bit, but lack confidence and conviction. The best way to gain confidence is through experience, and I think this is the year to actually do it.

No matter how uncomfortable I am with what I'm writing or where it's going or how lost I feel getting there, I know that discomfort is better than the feeling of disappointment I'll have if i quit.

It reminds me of leaving my religion, in a way. I considered going back, in a few bouts of hell-phobia, what if I'm wrong sort of thinking. The idea, though, crushed me. I knew that no matter how frightened I was, the fear was more liberating than living inside that bell jar. I felt a strong kinship to Sylvia Plath at the time; I had felt the breeze that came when a small corner of the jar lifted, and couldn't bring myself to live without it.

So--I'm off to my day job now, and looking forward to my new challenge.