Why I’m Doing Camp NaNoWriMo
By: Mallika Kamat
Tags: Creativity, Habit Building, NaNoWriMo, Writing, Camp Nanowrimo

Why I’m Doing Camp NaNoWriMo

It’s the perfect opportunity to answer the question — can I write? I took the risk and fell in love with writing. Mallika Kamat Jun 15·8 min read

Photo by Dan Counsell on Unsplash

I’ll be participating in Camp NaNoWriMo July 2021!

My writing journey began with NaNoWriMo 2018. I won — wrote 50,000 words — only to realize I had good characters but didn’t know how to make a novel-length story work. During the next few months, I decided to change genres from Mystery to Fantasy and Mystery. I worked on writing craft from December 2018 till March 2019 and re-wrote a new draft of my novel — 50,000 words again — for Camp NaNoWriMo 2019 in April. I had a pretty decent draft then, one that actually had a ‘The End’.

So, yes. I think writing challenges are absolutely worth it. I learned so much from participating and winning NaNoWriMo 2018 and Camp NaNoWriMo 2019.

For an aspiring writer like me, Camp NaNoWriMo provides just the right degree of motivation needed to dedicate focussed time to work on a novel. After all, it’s only for a month.

So, what is Camp NaNoWriMo?

NaNoWriMo or the National Novel Writing Month is a challenge to write 50,000 words of a novel in the 30 days of November. It’s driven by a community of writers or WriMos, cheering each other on to the finish line.

If writing 50,000 words seems daunting, Camp NaNoWriMo is the perfect option. Camp NaNoWriMo, taking place in April and July of every year, allows you to set your own word count goal and work on any project.

The biggest advantage with Camp NaNoWriMo is that it can be your 30 days of working on writing of any kind. It doesn’t have to be a novel or even creative writing. No one will frown if you write non-fiction. Or poems, short stories, novellas, or even edit sections of your novel. It’s great for people with day jobs or other responsibilities since they cannot easily commit to writing 50,000 words in a month.

Not a writer of any definition? Then April can be your month of blogging, daily journaling or doing morning pages for reflection; it can be a month of personal discovery and exploration.

Why does Camp NaNoWriMo work?

I am by no means a prolific writer and before NaNoWriMo 2018, I’d never even tried writing a novel before. I studied Engineering in college, not creative writing. In 2018, I didn’t know if the story I had in me could become a full-length novel. I wasn’t even sure if I was cut out to be a writer!

In spite of the steep learning curve facing me and the challenges that come with learning a new skill, I managed to write 50,000 words. I’ve even done it twice now. I think there are two major reasons for this.

1. The structure of the challenge silences the inner critic

This is the best thing about using word count goals — you are encouraged to produce a certain word count per day, say 1,000 words. You are not expected to write a perfect draft. In fact, the community encourages you, and I wholeheartedly agree with them, that you should keep writing and overcome the urge to go back and edit.

Your focus shifts from writing award-worthy prose to just trying to get the story down. Even with your internal editor looking over your shoulder, sneering at your choice of words, it’s a lot easier to ignore the snide remarks because you still have x more words to write before you finish for the day. If you set a moderately challenging goal, those x words are doable — they’re just a few pomodoros away. You’ll be done in no time at all.

Photo by Author

This is how I cajoled myself in to finishing my novel during NaNoWriMo 2018. I repeatedly fought the urge to give up when the first difficulty hit or when I couldn’t foresee a way to conclude every single character arc.

You become a writer by writing. There is no other way. So do it. Do it more. Do it again. Do it better. Fail. Fail better. — Margaret Atwood on MasterClass

But here’s the thing, you must continue writing to become better at it. I was cringing all through my Act I but as I finished Act II, I fell in love with my characters. My first attempt at a cozy mystery failed, so the next time I put my beloved characters into a fantasy setting.

I knew I was making mistakes. I’d write a scene then a few scenes later realize that it needed to change or be moved elsewhere. But I never went back. I never paused to go back and re-write those problematic scenes, because I wasn’t sure if it would be needed by the time I wrote ‘The End’.

Early on, I listened to excellent advice from Rachael Stephen — it’s more important to write a good serviceable draft rather than a pretty one. V. E. Schwab, author of The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, talks of working on the bones (plot) first, the muscle (character) next and finally putting on the lipstick (prose), even if you happen to love writing prose.

So I put the bare bones in and postponed worrying about things I should have added till the next draft. Whenever I realized I missed an opportunity to foreshadow an event, I just made a note for myself and moved on.

Starting your writing journey with word count goals, also ensures that you don’t stop writing because of what Ira Glass calls, the gap. The gap exists because initially, your skills are inferior to your taste. I knew I sounded nothing like published writers, but I also knew that the only way to close the gap was by continuing to write. Adam Grant, in his book Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World, makes the same point: quantity will eventually lead to quality.

There’s just one caveat to chasing word counts: don’t just write for the sake of hitting your word count goal. Do not pad your writing; a certain sized manuscript is not the point. A working story is.

2. Word counts are measurable and motivating

The thing about writing is that it can easily become an amorphous thing that you’re always aiming to do. It’s easy to convince yourself to not write today because you must research more, learn more about the craft of writing or spend more time building your fantasy world (warning: that might be worldbuilder’s disease).

Given the choice, new writers will spend precious time trying to learn from AuthorTubers about writing voice, foreshadowing, etc. before they even encounter that problem in their own work. I was particularly guilty of doing this. I was procrastinating, not writing, because facing our inadequacies is hard. But here’s the thing — learning about writing won’t really produce your next book, applying what you have learnt will.

It’s not that AuthorTube is bad. I am deeply grateful to Brandon Sanderson’s creative writing classes on YouTube (here’s the playlist). You can learn so much from him and the guest lecturers even if you don’t write science fiction or fantasy. But, as Sanderson mentions in the very first clip, you will find these lectures far more engaging and useful when in the midst of your own writing.

I can’t teach you how to be a writer. I just can’t. Writing is a skill that you have to practice on your own. — Brandon Sanderson in My Philosophy on Teaching Writing

It’s one thing to learn about plot and a whole other thing to effectively incorporate a main plot and juggle several sub-plots in your story. With a word count to aim for, you must get your act together and, at least, try writing a scene.

After a writing session, there’s immediate feedback in the form of a word count. The Camp NaNoWriMo site utilizes the progress principle, by requiring you to track your word counts after a writing session, and gives you a visual representation of progress made which further boosts your motivation. According to psychologist Jonathan Haidt, immediate feedback at each state, helps you reach flow state.

Of course, there are times when you cannot exclusively rely on a word count goal. For instance, after the first draft is written and you’re editing your work, a scene that needs to be cut or made more concise must be cut or shortened, even if it lowers your word count. Always do what is best for your work.

Sometimes, you need to work on a problem for a long time or do the necessary research before you can proceed to the next step. At such a juncture, tracking time rather than just word counts may be more useful; you won’t feel needless guilt for being unproductive.

You are the best judge of what you need at any given time. Given the opportunity, I’ll spend months vaguely ruminating about the fantasy world of my characters, without actually writing. My personal cure is participating in a challenge like Camp NaNoWriMo or NaNoWriMo.

Conclusion

Although I didn’t participate in the official Camp NaNoWriMo 2020, I did the challenge for myself during March and below is a review of week 14 in my bullet journal. I talk of finishing Act II and figuring out the ‘All Is Lost’ moment in Act III.

Photo by Author

In hindsight, I’m really glad I started earlier than usual in 2020 because, as the pandemic worsened around me and I struggled to meet my daily word count goals, I still kept at it, finally finishing in the first week of April.

Keeping up a consistent writing routine had gifted me with the habit of writing. Even when I didn’t feel like it, I was sitting down at my computer at a certain time and typing away, trying to channel my anguish into something creative.

If you try the Camp NaNoWriMo challenge and stick with it, you’ll have a manuscript that may or may not be good; but if the fear of a bad product stops you in your tracks, well, what if some of it is bad but not all of it? What if you realize that you’re not great but you are willing to work for it? That’s what happened to me.

When I first started writing, I knew it wasn’t up to par but was surprized by the pleasure of falling in love with my characters. The story needed heavy re-writes but I was willing to do it. And so, I’ve stuck to it ever since, improving my story and skill with each draft.

So take the risk, try the experiment. Prove to yourself that you can do it — you can write — and you’ll have the gift of a dependable habit. I enjoy writing more than I could have thought possible. It just feels right, in spite of the difficulties. I could never have figured this out if I hadn’t tried.

I’m doing Camp NaNoWriMo this July. Are you doing it with me?

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