We are three short days away from the mid-way point to this year’s NaNoWriMo!

To my immense relief, I managed to make up for Week 1’s slow writing and reached the mid-point to my novel yesterday.

At some points, I push through the writing even when I don’t feel like it. Some scenes come out clunky and very “mechanical” in ways. Others flow easy and in an effortless manner. But what matters is to keep writing anyway.

The challenge for me this time around has been suppressing my urge to edit compulsively.

I reread the chapter or scenes I wrote the day before and inevitably end up making a large number of changes – some that are minor fixes and inconsequential to the plot, others that end up impacting other linked scenes and require future rework.

Quite a bit of my word count has been repeated edits and scenes cut out, restructured, rewritten, and recycled all over again. While this is by no means a bad thing, it certainly does make that final destination seem that much farther away.

I expect that even after November 30 comes around, this cycle of self-editing and rewriting won’t end. While I fully intended for this draft to be the final one for my novel, I’ve made my peace with the fact that there is no hard cap on how many drafts to write.

What matters is having fun with it – with every stage, whether it be that first draft fresh out of the creativity press of your mind, or if it’s the repeated editing and rewriting toward the end of your novel’s journey.

With that in mind and spirits high, I’ll sign off this quick blog post with happy vibes and wishes for all the other Wrimos out there. We’re tackling that word count and just days away from grabbing that first 25k!

Stay inspired and keep writing folks!

Would you like to be a part of my publishing journey?