Leap Into Life
On Wednesday, I noticed that I probably wouldn't finish my novel in November and decided that I would have to re-plot, re-build, and write a second draft. At first it was an unfortunate revelation, but I, soon, adjusted my thinking (being the optimist I am) and came up with another ocean metaphor!
Turns out, I wasn't swimming in the Nanowrimo ocean. I was swimming in the novel ocean. The end of the ocean didn't end in November when I finished the novel or in December after making a few meager edits. It'll end when the novel is written, edited, and, if I'm lucky, published. It's a longer ocean, a much longer ocean but it's the ocean I'm swimming in and have been swimming in since November started. And then, I noticed this island. It was small, but when I reached it, I was able to sit on the warm, white sand for a minute and take a few deep breathes. Turns out, the island was big enough to regroup and plan for draft two. There's even space for me to build characters, build the world (dystopian), and re-plot! So, am I quitting? It all depends on your perspective. A goal oriented person could say "yeah, it's quitting", but being an ambitious, flexible, idealist, it's simply a change of plans. So yeah, you could call it quitting, but for me, it's a whole other part of the novel ocean to swim through, and I honestly can't wait! How does this all relate back to life? Good question. I think the biggest thing I can think of is how a lot of times, we're swimming in an ocean we didn't think we were swimming in. I thought I was swimming in the nanowrimo ocean, but, as it turns out, I was swimming in the novel ocean. It may turn out that it's a harder, longer ocean, but figuring out the ocean is the first step to swimming it. On a side note, you never know when you'll find an island in the middle of an ocean! With that, I'll end this blog post, so I can start planning draft two (I'll be sure to post on all the joys of plotting and world building). Good luck swimming your oceans and if you need it, I hope you find your island.
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I will begin this post by telling that unless you've got half a novel or are a really fast writer, you probably won't be able to start national novel month at this point in the month- sorry. If you are writing for nanowrimo (national novel month), want to write a novel, want to revel in my experiences for five minutes, or just want inspirational metaphors about life, keep reading.
National Novel Month is like an ocean. It's long and deep and you can't cross it in a day, and you can barely cross it in a month, for that matter (30,000 words?!). Sometimes the sea is rough and other times it's calm (sometimes you're thousands of words away from your daily target, other times your writing up a storm). No matter how you want to relate nanowrimo back to the ocean, you will eventually find that I am not crazy and neither is my metaphor! Being the 16th, we are one day over the half way mark. YAY! We've made it this far! The sea started out slow and shallow. If you were behind your daily goal, you could easily deal with it tomorrow. You could rewrite your opening sentence, and if you really wanted to, change your idea completely. There was freedom and little pressure because "hey, it's only day three". But now we're in the middle. We're struggling to catch up with the bare minimum word count. We have no idea where our story is going (well, I have no idea where my story is going). And worst of all, there is a part of us that is ready to stop writing or even make the dreaded switch between novels in the middle of the month! Giving up would be easy. I could stop writing and never update my word count again. I could quit. But that would be lame. To give up when we're only half way into the month. To give up when there is still half a story to write. To give up and leave our characters who we've put in terrible situations and major conflicts hanging, not knowing where to go or what to do. So, we have to keep writing. We have half a novel to write (or more)! We have to guide our characters to their destiny and hopefully to the climax and resolution (a good one if they're lucky). So we must keep writing because there is still half the ocean left, and at the end of this ocean, there is a calm area where your character run on the beach and where the waves lap up on the shore. That is where we're going. And we must get there. Now, how to relate writing a novel back to life? Well, for one thing, we are all swimming in a sea of our own right now and whether or not we are in the middle, there is an end to this ocean, with a beautiful beach. And then, you can swim through another ocean doing something else, following another passion, another pursuit. For now, we just have to keep swimming to get to the beach! (I'll be sure to fill you in on what the end of nanowrimo's ocean looks like!) |