This month is #March100kChallenge in one of the groups I am in. Of course, being the NaNoWriMo nerd that I am, 100K words in one month was exciting. I mean who wouldn’t want to write all of that in a month to challenge yourself. We’ve had people write an entire novel in just 5 days and plenty of romance authors write a novel in a month constantly. Now, writing all of that can be difficult and even I know this, so what is someone to do when there is so much struggle?
Dictation
This is probably one of the best options out there. I’m not even kidding with how fast you can get words pumped out by just vocalizing it. We speak so much faster than we ever type because of the pausing and everything. Some people may type fast enough to keep up with speech but even they will have to stop for a minute so their hands wont cramp up. Dictation, your tongue will never cramp up and you can just do pure word vomit without worrying about if the sentence flows properly. You can go back and edit later, after all, that’s what a first draft is for.
Word Sprints
This is probably the best option for those who want to just type. Set up a small alarm that goes off after a bit of time and just write as much as you can. A bigger push is to make your text white so you can never backspace and don’t worry so much about your prose looking purple.
Staying Consistent
If you can write about 3k words a day you can probably get the word count out. Don’t even focus on the word count either. Seriously, that will slow you down. If you reach 3k and still want to keep writing, then keep going. If you do go above and beyond, don’t expect that to mean that you get to slow down the next day or you will fall behind. It’s just not pretty.
Plot your Writing
Getting stuck can be a pain. Thankfully, we can overcome this through even a basic outline or beat sheet. Even if you don’t stay completely close to the outline, having something to reference can be beneficial on where you should aim for. When you go out for a drive, you don’t just drive out onto the road without knowing a basic idea of the route. You may take a detour but you’re still going towards a specific goal. Yes, even you pantsers this can be important to have some goals to hit.
Personal Goal
Right now, I personally wat to finish Dragon Guardian so a challenge is pushing me to finish it. My end goal is around 125k so obviously, I need to keep writing. At day 9 I’ve only hit 555 words due to being busy and then these past few days I’ve been really sick. So obviously, I’ve hit a rut but I’m not giving up because I still want to finish Dragon Guardian. You can follow the process of how far I am in plotting and writing Dragon Guardian personally on my side bar and cheer me on.
Happy writing and good luck on getting those words out. Make your own challenge if you need to but don’t stop writing.
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