NaNoWriMo: What Is It And Why Should I Participate?

By Callista Accardi on October 24, 2014

http://freelancewritingteam.com

Every November, blog sites are bombarded with a single word that has been gaining popularity and is now so well-known that it is internationally recognized: NaNoWriMo.

The word itself is a modern type of acronym, and stands for National Novel Writing Month. The goal of NaNoWriMo is to write a novel of 50,000 words; you start at 12:00 a.m. on November 1, and try to have the word count at 50,00 by 11:59 p.m. on November 30. Anyone can do it–not only writers–and it is very popular in today’s pop culture.

Think you want to participate? Well before you frantically hit the “back” button on the left corner of your screen, let me tell you: it is one of the most fun things I have ever done, even if the time crunch is a bit disconcerting at first.

Even if you’re the type of person who doesn’t think they have a creative bone in their body, you’re terrified of writing things that could possibly ever see the light of day, or you just don’t think you’re cut out to be a “writer,” it is a lot of fun, and an opportunity for you to explore your creative side.

It is completely up to you whether or not you want others to see your work; NaNoWriMo is not an organization or website, but a movement for people anywhere and everywhere to explore their creative side in solidarity with others.

That said, you don’t have to share. If you want to publish it to every social network you have access to, hand out free copies to random passers by, and shout from the rooftops that you wrote a novel, that’s great!

But NaNoWriMo is for you and you alone, so if you want to keep it hidden in the furthest crevices of your computer, encrypted to the nth degree so no one will ever find it, that’s great too!

As Javier Marias said in his article, There are seven reasons not to write novels (and one to write them),“writing novels allows the novelist to spend much of his time in a fictional world, which is really the only or at least the most bearable place to be.”

Not to say that your world or life isn’t bearable, but writing a novel allows you to explore another world full of possibilities and awesomeness.

In short, NaNoWriMo is crazy and fun, and is quite challenging, but is also incredibly fun and a great way to improve your creativity. If you’re interested in writing, whether it be a passion of yours or something you’re curious about, NaNoWriMo is definitely something you might want to look into trying out.

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