Week 4

Judgement day is now very near. Our days to finish the novels we’ve been working on this November are almost over, and it’s time for the final push. It doesn’t matter if you have 49, 000 words or 5, 000 words, be ruthless this week. Cut out as much of your socializing as you can and beg or bribe someone else to do your housework. Your focus should be on writing this week, and getting as close to 50, 000 words and “the end” as possible.

It’s entirely possible that if you free up enough time, you can write almost your entire novel this week. So don’t despair if you’re behind, and if you’re ahead, keep pushing yourself towards the end. Of course there’s some things you still need to do–for example, paying bills is important, so you shouldn’t quit your job just so you can write this week–but the great majority of things aren’t that essential. TV is not important, and your family and friends don’t need all your spare time either.

You can do all the fun things you want when this month is over, and you’ll feel a lot better about yourself if you actually finish the novel before you go out to celebrate and have fun.

Don’t let yourself down. Write as much as you can every day this week, and you’ll walk away from Nanowrimo with most or all of a novel. Then go out and celebrate, but don’t take a break for too long. Now is the perfect time to create or strengthen your writing routine, since you’ve been writing every day or almost every day for a month. If you’ve been writing for two hours every day this month, maybe you’ll want to cut it back by one, but don’t let the writing routine you created during Nanowrimo slip away. That routine is one of the most important things you can have, and it will allow you to get much more done over the course of a year than you’ve managed to before.

So open your word document and start writing–and make sure you write every day until the end!