Given the fact that a particular idea for a sci-fi-novel is bobbing around in my head for over ten years now but my lazy self could never get around to actually write something down I chose this challenge to finally do something about it. Since it coincided with the
NaNoWriMo I took their approach and participated. As a starting point for my novel I wrote down a timeline of historical events that lead to the world in the distant future were my story takes place long ago. I used that historical timeline together with some keywords on a general plot outline, which I also noted down years ago. This was my whole starting material. The things I missed was a strong antagonist, character names and also a big showdown. My hope was that these necessities would come as soon as I get into the process of constant writing. Making things up as you go along is a big part of the
NaNoWriMo approach and since I usually need hours to develop a single name for a given character and then lose interest in writing any further this approach appealed to me very much.
What did I expect from this challenge? Well, to be honest I know that I’m far to removed from writing fiction for so long now that I rather wish for a ghost writer to just write down my ideas than to make it myself. What I wanted to achieve is some kind of text which has a considerable length and which at least plots down my novel idea in any kind of form. I was not expecting to get a sensible piece of good literature. It was more a challenge of willpower and to prove myself that it is possible to write down an elaborate and long idea. The hope was that the feeling of getting things out in the real world would give me a sense of success and motivation to go on and continue to be creative.
So what was the result? Well, as you know if you have read the blog so far, I aborted the challenge after 19 days because I couldn’t stand the process. I made it through ⅔ of the time of the challenge and managed to write about ⅓ of the planned 50000 words. I am happy that I have at least gotten some text done and I still think that with some refining my idea can be a decent novel some day in the future, but some obstacles blocked my way now so I will come to the things that lead to the premature ending of this project.
The first thing I noticed during writing is, that writing a long text as such is no longer such a special task for me as it might have been 10 years ago when I first wanted to write a novel. 10 years ago my phrasing in the fiction sector might have been better than now, but then I was unable to even imagine to write such a long piece of text. Today I write texts as a living. I write letters, patent applications and petitions the whole day and if I count the words or pages of what I write each week I think that the amount will be enough for two novels each year. The only difference is that these texts are separate pieces and never one long work of art. Nevertheless the technical process is the same. So, not only do I know that I can write this amount of words, which means that I don’t have to find this out any more, but the actual work itself interferes with how much energy I have left for writing anything else. If I already write 50000 words a month, every month, there just isn’t enough energy to double that amount.
This might have been only part of the reason why this challenge failed. The other main part was that the
NaNoWriMo approach is very stressful. If you fall behind it gets harder and harder to reach the finish line. All you can think of is the amount of text you have to produce. Every time inspiration or energy fails, your goal gets a little bit further away and the feeling of failure drags me down. This leads to all kinds of physical symptoms (headaches, tension, insomnia…yes I’m very sensible to that kind of thing) and inhibits further progress so that the goal gets farther and farther out of reach. It is really a downward spiral.
What have I learned from this challenge? I learned that writing fiction as a hobby is a very energy robbing activity. It is isolating in the sense that I cannot do it while doing anything else, like talking to my wife or watching tv or anything. I have to isolate myself, concentrate hard to get into a mood of inspiration and then use this one or two hours to really get along. During writing, my emotion is spiraling up and down. Sometimes I feel like watching a movie in my head and can only barley keep up with writing down what I see. At those times I feel like a big creator, it lifts me up, I feel invincible. But then comes a phase where I doubt everything, my whole existence is at stake, everything I do or think or believe is questioned and deconstructed till there is nothing left but blackness and depression. These ups and downs transcend into everyday life, influence my physical well-being and my relations to others. It would be really neat to have my own novel in hands, but really seeing and feeling the costs of the creative process was new and this is the main part of what I learned. Often in life we all want to have one thing or the other but most often we can only fathom the costs to reach these goals. To try and do it, gave me a clearer picture and I noticed that having the manuscript was not worth the cost at the moment and hence I decided to stop.
Will I finish the novel? Yes. I’m still motivated to do this and blame at least some part of the tedious process to choosing the wrong approach for myself. I thought about two different approaches that I will try during a future challenge. One approach consists of writing every day but without looking at the wordcount. This might be less stressful and lead to less text but also to less negative symptoms. Another approach would be to split the remaining story down into plot parts and distribute the parts over the course of 30 days like I did with the crochet challenge. So far I have already planned my next few challenges so trying to write again will not be scheduled until somewhere next summer at the earliest.
What is always uplifting for me, is writing these summaries. Pondering about my past project, analyzing and planning future projects gives me great pleasure and motivation and this alone is reason enough to continue with these challenges.
