NaNoWriMo Tip: Write and Don’t Look Back

Photo credit: Ars Electronica on Flickr

With NaNoWriMo in full swing, many writers have joined the writing race to 50,000 words. Whether for the prizes, bragging rights, a new WIP or just the sake of writing, NaNoWriMo gives writers of all levels of experience the chance to prove that they have what it takes to write a book in a month.

Writing 50,000 words in thirty days isn't easy, but one way to make the task a little more manageable is this: don't look back.

I know it's tempting—we're writers, many of us perfectionists, and when you write at the speed that's necessary to complete the NaNoWriMo goal, most times the writing that results isn't exactly Hemingway quality. Because of that, many writers feel the need to go back and edit what they've written before moving on.

But if you're serious about completing NaNoWriMo and you'd rather not make the task even more difficult than it already is, you cannot look back. 

Look, the goal of NaNoWriMo isn't to have a publishable masterpiece by December—it's to get your butt in the chair and write 50,000 words of a story that you didn't have thirty days ago. The goal isn't perfection—it's words, plain and simple. It's to write, and write quickly, which means it's probably not going to be your best, but that's ok. No one's asking you to write something you can publish on December first. Your goal is just to write. 

But what's the problem with looking back? you ask. Can't I edit and still complete the required 50,000 words by the end of the month? 

I'm not going to tell you that's it's impossible to edit and write a WIP in thirty days—it's certainly possible, it's just unnecessarily difficult. Editing isn't meant to be done quickly, and the problem with editing your writing throughout the course of NaNoWriMo is that it slows down the writing itself. That time that you're spending editing chapter one could be spent writing chapter two.

I know there are writers successfully edit while completing NaNoWriMo, and I don't doubt that there will be some of you who read this post then go on to do it anyway. But if you truly want to make the process as stress free and quick as possible, then I highly recommend you surge forward without looking back until you've written the words THE END on the final page.

What do you think? If you're doing NaNoWriMo, will you be editing while writing?