@stereophonic-aftershock I found some really good tips in the nano tag this morning when I was looking for a funky YAY NANO picture, so I went ahead and reblogged it!

With regards to the DO NOT DELETE – if you’re like me and can’t deal with multiple versions of a scene all in the same document, simply move all the bits you don’t need to a second file. That keeps the original clean and keeps the old work safe for word counts. NaNo isn’t about having a stellar finished project, after all, so it’s not about what you revised and kept. It’s about all the words you put into it in the first place to get it done. Can’t think of how you want to word a bit of dialogue? Yeah you could sit there and mull it over, or you can write out every iteration of it you can think of until one feels right.

My sister used to skip entire sections if she was getting stuck or if she thought it would take more research/time than she wanted or if it risked boring her, so she’d write THEY TRAVEL TO XYZ or BIG ACTION SCENE GOES HERE and then just keep going with the parts that interested her. I’ve had people write a couple lyrics in their piece to remind their future self what sort of mood they wanted to rework a scene with, what might’ve inspired a bit of action and whatnot.

If you’re not active in the NaNo forums but you have twitter, I imagine twitter’s NaNo & amwriting tags will be full of writers announcing & doing writing sprints. If you can’t find them or you like working alone, set your own sprints and give yourself rewards for tackling them.

Find some decent headphones. Make a playlist for your book and dance to it. Make moodboards. Drink water. (Drink not-water). Remember that late-night writing sessions are fun but that a sleepy brain makes trudging progress. Take walks to give your eyes and fingers a break. Most of all, have fun.