I am participating in National Novel Writing Month. It is an experience that I tried last year, and I really loved it. I decided to try it again this year. The way that this event works doesn’t work with my OCD. The idea is to write a 50,000-word novel in a month. If the writer paces themselves well, then they should write 1,667 words a day. Given my OCD, I would want to write as much as I possibly could as fast as I could and reach the goal to ensure I could do it. However, the event is set up with badges to help the writer meet goals and one of the badges is writing 1,667 words a day. I can understand the idea because the event is meant to have writers writing all month long not just write as fast as they can at the beginning of the month.
I wrote out a plan to give me a roadmap for my writing this month. I know what I should be writing, and I also know that I can change my plan if I want to change it. I am finding that I have to have patience taking the writing process one day at a time. Instead of worrying about writing an entire novel, I just concentrate on writing the section that I want to write for that day.
I am finding that it is also a great life lesson. I know it’s great to have plans and goals for the future and I can put work into them. However, when it comes to worry, I have to realize that the future isn’t my main focus, I need to concentrate on today and take things one step at a time. There’s other people who might be able to juggle tons of things all at once, but not me. If I try to do that, I just get overwhelmed with that feeling of “wrongness”. When I get overwhelmed, I am like a deer caught in headlights. I’m not good to anyone. It’s much better to be right here, right now. I can give tomorrow up to God’s hands.
My faith saved me. May God’s peace reside in all of our hearts.
