Et Tu, Nano?

Well, it's November 30th and I went through my word count for the month and came up with a whopping 13,000 words. And that's including what I've hand written

At first blush, I'm disappointed. I knew I wasn't going to make my 50,000 word goal, but I thought I would at least break 20,000. Nope. Didn't even break 15,000.

I stopped and read through what I had written. It's pretty good stuff, if I do say so myself. I've learned through this that I can write without an outline and I can get a lot done in a short amount of time. Not only that, but what I write, when I go from the gut, can be quite good.

I also realized that this month was heavy with things that took my focus away from writing. I didn't handle that as I had hoped I could handle it, but I think I've learned that sometimes life is going to get in the way. And it's okay. The key is to pick up the pieces quickly after and to keep moving foward.

I've also learned that it's easy to get out of a habit, but that once I'm in a daily writing habit, I don't spend as much time trying to find the story again when I finally do sit down to write. I know, it's a "Duh" moment, but sometimes it takes me a little while to get the hang of things. And even though I've learned this lesson, that doesn't mean I'm going to live it. I'm rather, um, bad that way, lol.

I guess, all in all NANO was a good experience. I didn't reach my goal. But I learned things I don't think I would have learned if I had been successful with my goal. Isn't that what life is about? How you live the journey, not necessarily where you end up? No? Well, it sounds good anyway.