NaNoWriMo Prep: Here we go!

Ladies and gentlemen, NaNoWriMo starts in less than 24 hours! Are you ready?

Now is the time for last-minute outline tweaking, making sure you're stocked up on all the supplies you need (paper and pens if you're using them, coffee, frozen meals for your family), and spending some time with friends and family before you abandon them for the crazy, big adventure that is 50,000 words in 30 days.

It's going to be a strange ride for you whether this is your first, second, fifth, or eleventh trip to NaNoLand. Things may not go according to plan. You may spend some of the month hating your novel. And that's okay because you'll also learn something about yourself along the way. You'll learn that you can make time to write. You can write a full-length novel in one month. That's what this experience is really about. It could be that all you need to really push yourself is to show yourself that the time is there, as long as the passion is.

I know what you may be thinking as you watch the clock tick down on the NaNo homepage. You may be thinking something along the lines of, "Oh, my goodness! What have I gotten myself into? Why did I think I could do this? I don't have an outline, my main character is flat, and the plot is worse than Plan 9 from Outer Space! Who does this every year?"

Before you start hyperventilating, I have one bit of advice.

It's going to be okay.

NaNo is supposed to be fun. It's supposed to be a way for you to prove to yourself that you can make time in your busy life to spend time with the characters that follow you around all day. It's okay if you don't finish. It's okay if your plot is so bad you won't even reread it yourself. That's not what this is about.

So when midnight arrives, take a deep breath, open a blank word document, and start writing. Don't let the non-writer in you talk you out of it. Just have fun!

Good luck, and happy scribbling!