Kicking Butt

"Novels don't write themselves." 

Well, duh. If I had a cup of water for every time I've read or heard that I could buy myself a whale to live in it. People like to state the obvious. Sometimes, it needs to be stated. Sometimes, I, as a writer, need to hear that. And then I think, Well, duh. Then I go write for a day. Maybe two.

But nobody ever tells you how freaking hard it is to keep writing when you have nothing waiting for you at the other end. There's no "I won NaNoWriMo 2012" buttons or $1000 prizes or an automatic book contract. You don't even know if people will want to read what you're writing. It's depressing but its true.

Unless. Unless you have awesome people who believe and invest in you and build you up without filling your brain full of fluffy compliments. For some people, this is enough incentive to write every day. You are awesome. (If you don't have these kinds of friends - start looking! They're out there.)

I am not one of those people. I can do NaNoWrimo. I can do writing contests. But when it comes to my personal writing I am a slacker. I have an amazing 'tribe' that I meet with every month or so who are some of the most delightful, encouraging people I know. They like me and my writing. (Unless they're just phenomenal actors... :) But sadly this is not enough for me to write every day.

My Y5 Tribe does challenge each other to write 500 words every day and sometimes we post deadlines for everyone but its hard to keep up. Three of them are off at college and Miss Goff has at least ten jobs at any given time. It's hard to keep each other accountable when we don't interact with each other every day.

You know what else is hard? Developing habits. If I'm a slacker with my writing I am an epic fail at habit making. Especially when it comes to writing. I'm also the Almighty Golden Empress of Procrastination but we won't talk about that.

Anyway. I found myself in a bit of a conundrum earlier this week thinking through all those deep thoughts. I desperately needed someone to kick my butt and I was complaining to one of my best friends who is also a writer. We were in the same situation and she asked me to PLEASE help get her started back in writing. (She desperately wants to finish her Zombie novel.) We both agreed butt kicking was in order.

Ms. Avie and Me :)

Problem #1: We don't even live in the same state. Avriel moved to Colorado and I'm in Georgia. Butt Kicking? How will that work?

Problem #2: We've tried this before. We tried earlier in January to keep our goal of 500 words a day and let the other know when we finished and yay, give digital hugs and cookies etc. But it wasn't superbly successful. So basically I was thinking... um okayyy... but something's gotta give... 

Avie texted me back and said: "How bout from 6pm-8am neither of us can text the other till our 500 is written?"

My first thought was, um, NO, I like talking to you thank you very much... But then I thought some second and third thoughts and realized... Okay, that's actually a fantastic idea. We text each other 24/7 and that's definitely a big enough incentive for me to write.

We started Monday. I've finished the first two chapters of Book Three and I'm slowly but surely getting re-immersed in my story. Sometimes it absolutely sucks. But I have to grow up and write at some point. So I did.

And that feels beyond good.

That's how good accountability works though, right? Somebody who loves you, comes along, tells you to get over yourself... and then goes through the sucky business of fixing yourself with you. And its honestly very nice to know that someone is suffering with you.

So. I solved my problem. Now go find someone to kick your butt and ask if you can kick theirs too. Accountability has to work both ways. And you could ask more nicely. That's just my advice. :D

Also... If you would like to check out my Zombie Loving friend she blogs at http://spirit-mind-and-body.blogspot.com/. She doesn't blog about Zombies to my knowledge but she is an amazing photographer and writer and she's nice enough to be my friend so I think she's pretty cool. :) I'm sure she would love it if you left an encouraging comment, too. 

Is anyone else finding ways around their Writer's Laziness? Or have advice pertaining to it? :)

NaNoWriMo Blues

The other day, one of my cool blogging friends suggested I do a post about 'where I am' in my writing. I have to say, it's not a very delightful place. (Oh, this is my cool blogging friend - you should go check her out. :))


Over the past four years-ish, during November, I participate in an epic word contest called NaNoWriMo, which stands for National Novel Writing Month. I won't go into details about that. But basically, during the course of the month, I wrote about 37,000 words, finished my novel and BAM. I was the happiest McKenzie on Planet Earth. 

This basically captures my feeling of accomplishment.

So wait, why am I sitting here in my computer chair feeling sorry for myself? I have a whole other exciting installment to start writing!!! 


Meh. It's like I was high on NaNo and now I'm completely wasted. Unproductive. Uninspired. Unimaginative. I have a great story to write, dang it! I know exactly where it should start, which should make the whole thing 10x easier. Right? So why can't I get started? 


It's not school... It's not lack of sleep... It's not the weather... It's not a B12 deficiency... (Well, it's not!) Every time I think about starting I groan and go lay on my floor and pretend to think deep thoughts. Or plan out genius strategies to force myself into writing again. Self punishment never seems to work for me though, I wonder why...


Some people tell you that you need a break from your story after NaNoWriMo. "You need something fresh!" they say. Don't ask me who - it's just general advice. But, c'mon, it's been over a month. Shouldn't that be long enough? Well. Okay. If you say so. 


So I started a new story about a whirlpool. Yeah. 


Needless to say, I stopped after two sentences. Wow, I thought, this is really quite incredibly stupid. I want to go back to my old story. The one that deserves my attention. The one that I love like my own child. The one that's so gloriously filled with old characters that haunt my waking dreams... 


Did I start back on it? 


No. 


I wish I could say this was a severe case of writer's block, but there's nothing blocked about it. I have the whole flipping beginning planned out!!


Nope, see, this is a severe case of Writer's Laziness. Straight up, uninspired, lay-on-the-couch-and-eat-Doritoes, gross, despicable laziness. 


There. I've confessed. I have no excuses. Not any good ones at least. So... what am I going to do now that I've written such a depressing post? *sigh*


I don't know. Maybe I'll feel so guilty for writing this nasty confession that I'll start writing just so I can post something super happy. This also might be one of my overly complicated strategies that will fail. But this one might work... hopefulness is never a bad thing, right? :)