NaNoWriMo No-Go

Last month I made a pathetic attempt at participating in NaNoWriMo. I wrote maybe a couple thousand words before getting sidetracked by procrastination and, eventually, life. But I'm proud of myself for the creative work I've done beyond that: my Creative Writing 101 class.

Having never taken a real writing class before, I was worried. Having never considered myself particularly creative before, I was terrified.

The first week, it was a challenge just to sign in to the class and read through the lecture. It took me days to get the nerve to do that, but once I did, I realized it wasn't so bad. The exercises were interesting, though some more than others and while I wasn't all that confident reading back on my first assignment, the feedback I got was good.

Since then, I've worked harder on my assignments and implementing the lessons learned that week. I've even started to *gasp* look forward to the next lecture, exercises and assignment. 

The thing I love most about the class is the way it's making me think about my writing. I've often sought perfection, and worked on things I cared about an awful lot. But from day one, our instructor stressed that the process and the output both had to be fun. Even though I'm considering nearly every other word much more carefully than I have before, it actually has been fun.

So maybe I didn't come out of November with a novel, but I did come out inspired and ready to take on more writing.