NaNoCutMo – My Quest to Do Less (In Words & Life)

My favorite things about November is National Novel Writing Month – or NaNoWriMo for short. The madcap, forsake-your-life-to-write-50,000-words-of-your-novel-in-30-days challenge that I’ve taken part in every year since 2003 – except 2022.

The thing about NaNoWriMo is that it’s self monitored, so if you need to bend the rules a little, no one is going to give you grief. Or at least that’s what I’ve decided. There have been years where I’ve done an editing challenge, spending 50 hours revising a completed manuscript instead of starting something new. Other years I’ve written 50,000 additional words to a manuscript in progress. The important bit is setting a specific writing related goal and getting it done in the month of November.

Last November I was just wrapping up my Phoenix Falling rewrite and starting to submit it to agents. There wasn’t enough work left to do on that book to make a NaNo goal, but it didn’t make sense to start writing a completely unrelated novel and potentially delay the submission process.

So I had a chill November. I enjoyed a leisurely Thanksgiving. I got COVID and could just veg on the couch without having to struggle through any ridiculous deadlines.

I missed the frantic energy. Which is kinda funny, because my last post was about how tired I was from my burst of momentum, but momentum – and life – is fickle like that.

Time For a New Kind of Challenge

I’ve known since last December that this November I had to do something. A few years ago I came up with an idea for a contemporary YA romance/coming of age roadtrip dramady called Diamond Road, and just a month or two ago I thought this would be the year I started writing that uncharacteristic mishmash of genres.

Except that those agent submissions I did last November were all a bust, as was round two in January. The one concrete bit of feedback I received was that my manuscript was probably too long. By fifteen thousand words (at least).

Someone told me that in March. Where did seven months go? (Well, I know. And soon you will too!)

But still. While my secret project was percolating and percolating and percolating and sometimes giving me indigestion, I was also stewing on the absolutely paralyzing thought of somehow cutting roughly 13% out of my beloved book-child which has already been overhauled about seven times. Like with most children, it’s grown with age, not shrunk.

It’s time to defy nature and figure this out.

Seems like a problem for NaNoWriMo. Or as I’m going to call it this year, NaNoCutMo. Because what I need is a firm goal, a firm deadline, permission to work on this during work and after hours, and the do-or-die mentality that has led me to win this crazy writing challenge every single year.

I have no idea how many hours this revision is going to take.

But I know how long I have to do it. Thirty days.

I talked last month about God clearing my schedule so I could make massive progress on my secret project. Well, my schedule is pretty clear, client wise, and the secret project is out of my hands until at least Thanksgiving, so now is actually a perfect time to get back to what this “sabbatical” (ha, I was so cute, thinking this was temporary) was originally about – molding Phoenix Falling into shape. Whatever it takes.

Why Does My Book Need To Be Shorter Anyway?

Could I ignore this advice? Sure, but doing so hasn’t gotten me anywhere thus far.

There are lots of publishing reasons why my manuscript should be shorter. The wordcount goes right near the top of every submission package, and 115k words is at least 15k higher than the recommended range for YA fantasy books from a debut author.

Sure, each and every word might be brilliant. But an overextended agent hoping to find the next big thing or at least a book good enough to sell is likely to see that larger than average number as a detriment.

Even if those words are brilliant, they cover more paper and use more ink, making the book more expensive to publish and more of a risk for a publisher. And a longer book from an author that isn’t yet known and hasn’t yet proved themselves may also be intimidating to readers, who aren’t sure they want to make that commitment.

A longer book means more work for the agent too. More pages to read, probably a few times. More feedback to give.

And the truth is, all those words probably aren’t brilliant. Many of them probably aren’t necessary.

As painful as trimming my novel down will be – and I’ve spent about seven months ruminating on that pain – it will almost certainly be better for it in the end. Because with fewer words, I’ll need to drill down to what’s actually important. Cut phrases and details and whole subplots that distract from the plot and character arc and emotional impact of the book as a whole.

Cutting down my novel will bring more focus to what remains. And isn’t focus almost always a good thing?

The Value of Less

I have a workmate with an interesting philosophy: Do Less. That’s the opposite of how I operate. I’ve always been a Do More kind of gal, whether it’s overachieving on a particular project or piling on responsibilities so I can avoid feeling my feelings. Sad? Grieving? Lonely? Nah, you’re just perpetually tired. And you don’t have time to worry about it. I’ve accomplished a lot that way, but I’ve also lived most of my adult life – and most of my teenage years too – chronically stressed and just generally overwhelmed, more concerned about all the things on my to-do list than the moment that I’m in. Am I alone in this? Or is this what the “American Dream” has become? Or as we call it now, hustle culture.

I’m not against working hard. I’m proud of my work ethic. Of the fact that I can force myself to write 50,000 words every November no matter how unlikely that seems. That I don’t miss deadlines, and I put in the hours I need to to get stuff done. But I’m starting to be against working just for the sake of working, with no purpose and no joy.

I want to do less. Not just in my novel, but in my life. But not in a generalized, I’m just going to take it easy and see what happens, who needs to show up at the office kind of way. Just like how I’ll edit my novel, I need to edit my life, thoughtfully picking out what needs to stay and what needs to go. So the things that stay are more focused and more effective.

I want to do less so I can love what I do more.

A few months ago I mentioned this philosophy to a friend, and she was understandably skeptical. Who was I, and what had I done with Amy Miller? But honestly, this resonates with me so much. Probably because it is so counter to how I live my life.

Doing less means being more deliberate about how I spend my time. It moves me away from the time scarcity mindset that plagues me, and has for as long as I can remember. It also gives me space to be more spontaneous when opportunities come my way. Like when I went to the Taylor Swift movie after seeing an acquaintance post on Facebook that she had extra tickets … less than two hours before showtime. That ended up being such a joy. I want more of that in my life!

Doing less also encourages me to get more rest, another thing I struggle with. My attempts to improve my sleep quality and quantity have been sort of a mixed bag, but for the first time in my life I’m trying. But sometimes rest doesn’t mean sleeping. It means giving myself space to introvert-out and enjoy unscheduled time recharging alone in my apartment. When I do more, that’s the first thing to go, and then I’m stressed out the whole time I’m doing all the things.

And when I do more, the pressure of my busy schedule tempts me to procrastinate. I sit in my car and scroll on my phone because I’m overwhelmed by the to-do list waiting for me in my apartment. It’s so dumb, and I do it all the time. When I’m mentally recharged I’m less inclined to waste time and more inclined to enjoy what I’m doing.

Fewer Words, Fewer Distractions

November is probably a weird time to try to Do Less when I’m also committing myself to a mentally taxing, time consuming goal. But maybe not. NaNoWriMo works for a lot of people because it encourages them to focus. If you really want to write 50,000 words, you may force yourself to write during times you’d otherwise be doing something else.

(That’s not always the case. For many years of NaNo–most of them, honestly–I just added writing 50,000 words on top of everything else I was doing like the superhuman productivity machine I was pretending to be. I’d come home from college for Thanksgiving break, spend all day with my friends or family, and then force myself to stare at my computer screen and write 5,000 words … or 10,000 words … from 9 pm until 2 or 3 in the morning. I have never been great at saying no, even when I really don’t want to do something. But as I’m no longer interested in staying up until 3 am but I am committed to this goal, maybe this is the year I start.)

One of the points of NaNoWriMo is just to get the words out … they don’t have to be good. If they’re great, then you’re probably doing it wrong, because it means you’re editing along the way when the challenge is all about finishing a first draft. NaNoCutMo will be different. I need these words to be good. Better than what’s on the page now, and ready to be sent out to publishing professionals.

To really improve my novel, I need mental clarity, not the ability to power through physical and mental exhaustion. So I need to strip away distractions. Do less, so I can love what I do.

More focus.
More rest.
Less nonsense.

It just may work. Or maybe not. But I intend to find out.

Do Less With Me This November

If I can, I hope to give brief weekly updates on this blog, while keeping track of my wordcount progress on my Instagram, @amymillerwrites. I would love to have you cheer me on! Thoughts, prayers, notes of encouragement, and support of all kinds are greatly appreciated.

And while most of you are probably not embarking on a intense writing goal this month – though if you’ve ever wanted to write a book, November’s a great time to do it! – I challenge you to try doing less and see how it goes. What can you cut out of your life that you won’t miss? What can you cut out of your life that you’ll be glad to see go? I’d love to hear about it. I believe in you!