NaNoWriMo starts this coming Sunday, which is both an exciting and terrifying thought. These last few days are flying past in a blur. I’ve been spending as much time as I can making sure I’m prepared for the big day, which involves writing outlines, prepping blog posts, and getting all my resources in order. I like to keep my writing set up pretty simple so that I can focus all my energy on my writing and not on messing around with programs, or other distractions, but there are a few things that are absolutely vital to keeping me motivated, especially during a marathon event like NaNoWriMo. Today, I thought I would share my top three with you.
4thewords
4thewords is a writing site that turns writing into an RPG. You battle monsters, level up your hero, and protect a fantasy world from a terrible threat, all while writing hundreds and thousands of words. It’s the most fun you can have while writing, and they always run a special event during NaNoWriMo, which is amazing. I’ve been using 4thewords for over 3 years now, and it’s helped me to write over 4 million words in that amount of time, so let me tell you, it’s effective. When you’ve got a whole queue of little monsters to defeat, quests to turn in, and a book to write, you can be there for hours, sucked in by the whole gameified experience.
They offer a 30 day trial period, which is perfect for if you want to try it out for yourself over NaNoWriMo And when your subscription runs out, you still have access to all your writing, even though you won’t be able to add to it, so you’ll always be able to save anything you’ve written. The storyline is fun, the battle system is designed to keep your writing, and there are hundreds of little quests to complete and turn in, which is one of my favourite things ever. 4thewords is one of my all-time favourite sites, and it keeps me motivated to write all year round, but especially during NaNoWriMo when I need that boost the most.
Spotify
No writing session is complete unless I have a great playlist to write along to. Personally, I love just switching on one of Spotify’s premade playlist and letting it run in the background. I have a whole selection saved for different moods and days, so that I can easily find something to listen to, without wasting precious writing time searching for something to listen to. Depending on the day, I can listen to gentle background music, ambient noise, soft pop songs, or heavy metal. Which is, admittedly, rather a strange mix, but at the same time, it’s very convenient to be able to access it all in one place. There’s a whole world of music out there at my fingertips. As a person who doesn’t like silence when I’m trying to concentrate, this is super helpful.
Discord
While Discord was originally designed to be for gaming chat, their servers are also awesome places to host writing groups. My local NaNo region runs its own super active Discord chat group, which I hang out in all year round. It’s a fantastic place to be able to connect with other writers, talk about writing woes, share successes, meet up for a virtual write-in over voice or text chat, or just to run word sprints. We have an amazing bot that can run timed word sprints, which I constantly use. I find that setting a time limit for myself while I’m writing can be super helpful, and very, very motivating. There’s a great sense of challenge in seeing how much I can possibly write in a stretch of time, and trying to beat my best total.
Belonging to this chat group has also helped me form some really strong friendships with other local writers. We talk every day. We sprint against each other. We’ve met up in person for events during November, as well as a few outside of it as well. And we’re always there to encourage and motivate each other. It’s become a huge part of my writing life, especially during NaNoWriMo, when the group is most active and there are people on at all hours of the day working on their novels. It’s magical.
These are my top three resources for keeping me motivated during NaNoWriMo. Without them, I definitely wouldn’t be doing as much writing. But I’d love to hear from you. Are you doing NaNoWriMo this November? What are your top writing resources that you couldn’t write without? Let’s chat in the comments!
Don’t forget, my new book Frost Hands is now available on Amazon in both print and ebook form. Pick up your copy today! Or, if you already own it, please take a couple of minutes to leave a review. It helps so much!
Photo by Cookie the Pom on Unsplash
