NaNoWriMo - Mission Accomplished

On November 1st I set a goal to do NaNoWriMo, NAtional NOvel WRIting MOnth – which was to work on a novel by writing 50,000 words by November 30th. Well, it’s November 30th, and I did it – I wrote 54,070 words, and it feels great!

   Not that it's been easy. I stated off the month really strong with 10,000 words by the end of Day 3 – and for the next few days kept going strong. But after the first week I started to get busy, I started working again, I found a million other things pulling away my attention – and as the month progressed I got farther and farther behind.

   Then, as I headed into this 4-day weekend for Thanksgiving, I reassessed the situation. When I got to work last Wednesday I checked my Word Count and was at 34,221. Not bad, but 15,000 words in 4 days, although tough, did seem do-able. As I left work on Wednesday for the holiday, I decided that I would just chain myself to my laptop all weekend and try to catch up.

   I had a bit of a drive to and from Family for Thanksgiving, so I used that time to ruminate on my story – develop a few parts of it a bit better, because it’s always easier to sit down to write when you have a few ideas ready to go. I jotted down a few notes, but really didn’t get much writing in on Wednesday or Thursday, because I wanted to spend the time with Family.

   So Friday I headed to Village Inn for “Breakfast” – or at least that was my excuse. I decided that if I stayed home, despite living alone, that I would get distracted by a sink of dirty dishes, laundry, and a million other things. No, I needed to go somewhere – somewhere I couldn’t really do anything but write. Besides, I was out of groceries and a nice omelet seemed the perfect motivation to start a day of writing. 4 hours later, with a nearly-dead laptop battery I had cranked out another 6,000 words. That put me over 40,000 words, and with 2 days to go I knew I could achieve this goal. I ran a few much-needed errands, recharged my batteries – both personally and my laptop, then Friday evening another few hours got me another few thousand words.

   Reinvigorated but tired, I slept-in on Saturday, and then again headed out to write – this time down to Malawi’s in Riverwoods for Small Business Saturday and lunch. Besides, bottomless fountain drinks always help. Another 4 hours, another dead battery, and goal achieved. [And, yes, I am pretty proud of myself!]

   I think that's how goals typically work: start strong, things get rough or boring and I start to lose steam. But with a deadline approaching and seeing that completion is within reach - well, it gives me that extra 'umph' to try. Which sometimes, just sometimes, leads to triumph.

   After 7 years at Franklin Covey, I did learn quite a few things that I continue to use even 15 years later. I do believe in setting SMART goals – and I don't just mean intelligent, but S.M.A.R.T.

• S – Specific – State EXACTLY what you want to achieve (Who, What, Where, Why)
• M – Measurable – How will you know you’ve achieved it?
• A – Achievable – Is it something you can realistically accomplish with the time and resources available?
• R – Relevant – Is it really important to you?
• T – Time-sensitive – Give yourself enough time, but always set a deadline.

   It doesn't always work, but lately I've done pretty good on my goals. I set an 83-day goal, and although I didn’t originally intend to blog every day, I did – and it felt great. As I’ve been job hunting the past few months, I set a goal to send out 100 resumes each week – and before I got this Temporary Contract, I was sticking to it; and even with working, I still spend a few hours every week sending out resumes. And now success on my goal with NaNoWriMo. My novel may not be done, but I'm 54,070 words closer to completion.

   So set your goals - because life is what you make of it. There are many areas of my life that aren’t going quite according to plan – but many of those are well-outside my circle of influence. But for those areas that I can influence and direct, I am really trying to. It does no good to just sit around and complain about life, because complaining about it doesn’t change it. So I choose to take action and make the changes that I want. It doesn’t always work, but when it does my life is better – and that’s really what life is all about anyway: Living the best life that you can, and moving a little forward today from where you were yesterday.