It’s crazy to think that another NaNo challenge is already upon us. Doesn’t it seem like NaNoWriMo 2018 just ended!? Last April was my first time participating in any NaNo challenges and I’m so glad I finally did it. I’ve learned a lot and this time around, I’m ready to crush it.
My Goal Next Month
As I mentioned in my post at the end of last year, I am planning to publish my work in progress before 2019 ends. Thus far this year, I’ve done pretty well in getting back into my novel and doing the necessary plotting I had to do to work out some kinks. At the time I’m writing this, I have about 41,000 words written. I’m very pleased to have reached this number.
I don’t have a set amount of words I want my novel to be, but my guess is that I will have this novel completed at 60,000 – 65,000 words. I’m not using this as a set number, but I do need to be over 60,000. Considering where I’m at right now, that’s totally doable.
The other day, I came up with my Camp NaNo goals for the month. I’m a bit of ahead of myself, I know, but I’m very excited about this. My ultimate goal is to finish the first draft of my novel. In terms of word count, I have set my goal at 25,000 for the month of April. It may be more or it may be less, but I had to give myself a hard number to go by!
I’m feeling very confident in achieving this goal. In November, I wrote 25,000 words, so I know that I can do it. Now, I obviously didn’t reach the goal of 50,000 words, but I’m still proud of the work I did. Part of the reason I believe I was so successful was because of the tool I created to keep me on track.
My NaNoWriMo Goal Tracker
This might make me sound like a total nerd, but I kind of love creating charts or tables in Excel or Word. I love creating something that looks organized and helps me stay on track. So, I created a tool to help me track my NaNo progress.
What I wanted was a way to log my goals by day, see how far below (or above) I was compared to my goal, and view my progress overall. With my tracker, I insert all of my daily goals and my starting word count (to keep track of my progress on the novel as a whole).
Each time I write, I enter how many words I wrote that day. I loved seeing how all the numbers changed. It helped push me a bit sometimes to write a little more. I’m all about “pretty” looking numbers. So if I was only 13 words short of 1200 words, I would write more.
It was a great way for me to pump more and more words out. It was like a little competition with myself. I also find that it’s incredibly important when working toward a NaNo goal to be constantly evaluating your progress so you can plan for success.
For my April goal, I already have my spreadsheet filled in. I’m ready to roll and can’t wait to start logging words!
You Can Get My Tool… For FREE!
If you want to check out my favorite tool and use it to help you win during Camp NaNo (or future NaNo challenges or your own personal challenge), you can get it today for free.
All you have to do is sign up for my newsletter and you’ll get the email to download it!
