I officially take back everything I ever said in the past about fellow writers who couldn't manage to stick with their NaNoWriMo projects all the way to the end of the event. Back when I used to win NaNo all the time, I didn't have anything close to a full line-up of professional and personal responsibilities to manage the way I do now. It's an entirely different ballgame when you do, as it takes more than just discipline and an iron will to keep all those balls in the air. Hats off to anyone who can make it work.
That said, I'm hanging in there pretty well this year myself. I've been staying on par with my NaNoWriMo word count every single day without exception. Keeping up with everything else writing-related I have on my plate was a challenge last week, so I spent a lot of this week playing catch-up with things like my Medium posts. I've figured out a few things along the way, though. May they help those of you who will struggle in the future to add an additional project to your writing schedules when you're already busy like a mo-fo.
You don't find the time. You make it.
I've written some Medium content about how to optimize your ongoing schedule for maximum productivity. I'm repeating the gist of what I said here because that's how important it is that you get it. I hear people continuously talk about wishing they had time to do what they want to do because they're just so busy.
That's the thing, though. Everyone's busy -- everyone -- and I can assure you a lot of the hyper-productive people you know are a lot busier than you probably are. They have the same 24 hours to work with every day that you do. They just got super serious about streamlining their schedules, so they're not wasting time on a bunch of bullshit, is all.
That said, I went into NaNoWriMo this month with a schedule that was already plenty full. I have multiple clients I write for every single week on a freelance basis. I have self-set writing quotas to meet each week on Medium and elsewhere. I work out for 90 minutes a day every single weekday. I do foreign language exercises every day to make sure I keep making good progress with my studies. I cook a homemade, balanced dinner for my household every single evening. I have an inviolable pocket of quality time I spend with Seth each day, as well.
Those are the essential things I have on my plate that must happen as planned and can't be sacrificed on the altar of one of my little vanity projects. So, what I've done is rob time from other activities, as well as put other non-critical tasks on hold completely for the moment. Examples include the video lectures I usually do daily and any excess time spent doing beauty treatments or vegging out in front of Netflix. I've also been writing on the weekends when I usually give myself a complete break. I'll be writing my way through the Thanksgiving weekend, as well.
In other words, I've been allowing myself a lot less free time to just dick around than I usually would. That won't be sustainable for long because I'd burn out big time if I tried to keep this up for much longer than a month or two. It's definitely doable on a short-term basis, though. If you genuinely want to finish whatever project you're trying to make room for, you'll make it happen.
Goals need to be specific and quantifiable.
I used to be horrible about keeping up with more than one thing at a time, and it took me most of my life to figure out why. I know myself, so I knew it wasn't that I didn't really want to do the things I said were important to me. I did. I just didn't yet realize that there are a right way and a wrong way to set goals. Naturally, I'd been doing things the wrong way my entire life.
Using vague language when you're planning out your goals doesn't cut the mustard. Goals need to quantifiable and come attached to definitive deadlines. For instance, instead of "I'll try to write more this month," you need to say, "I will write X-number of words by thus-and-so date, and I'll do it by completing a minimum of X-number of words every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday." Then actually do that, come hell or high water. Don't accept any excuses from yourself, and don't let anyone else take that time away from you, either. If anyone asks, you already have plans.
In other words, think about how you'd approach setting a deadline for work or scheduling a necessary appointment you can't afford to miss. Treat your creative goals the same way -- like necessities, not options.
Assume you'll need to make some adjustments.
At the beginning of the month, when NaNo first started, I did go in with a plan. I thought a lot about my schedule. I pared a few things down and put others that could wait on hold temporarily. Then I set a daily itinerary that I thought would work. And it worked pretty well in some ways -- not so much in others. Over the following weekend, I thought about what I didn't like about how that first week went and made some changes. This past week went much better, and I was able to get caught up where I'd fallen slightly behind on a couple of things.
So, after doing your best to put a plan together that should work for you, don't just throw in the towel and give up if things don't go the way you hoped. Just give some thought to what went wrong, and tweak a few things. If that doesn't fix the problem, make more adjustments. Eventually, you'll hit on a system that works the way you want it to, so just keep trying.
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