When I was writing my 50k words for NaNoWriMo, I wrote entirely alone for the month of November. I would not recommend that to most people.
Even if you are by nature more introverted, there is power in knowing that you are not pulling the sled alone.
A close friend once told me about one of his vacations where he met a sled team who raced the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. Apparently when you ride when those racing dogs, be prepared to get out of the sled and run up the hill because you will get the evil eye from them if you (the driver) are not also doing the hard work with them.
Writing with a group can give you momentum when you know that all of you are doing the work.
I missed out on all the coffeeshop and library write-ins but my goal is to do that this year.
In the meantime I have been doing the next best thing, which is trying to get out and meet other writers in person. I attended my first two meetups this month, one with a self-publishing group and one with a woman’s writing support group. It was extremely enjoyable and I will be attending a California Writer’s Club (local branch) meeting this weekend as well. (btw, that club was started by Jack London over a hundred years ago!)
I’m not a cyclist but I do watch events like the Tour de France. That’s a brutally long endurance event spanning 21 days (stages). There are roughly 20-22 teams, 9 riders per team. Based on the teammates various specialities (hill climbing), they will plan out who leads the pack and who pushes forward and when. This allows the cyclists to draft off each other (the front folks take the brunt of the resistance), and the chosen one can conserve energy and then bust out to finish strong.
Maybe writing can be like that. When the drafting of your novel gets tough, seek out a write-in so that you can gain momentum from the team of writers and then make a surge to finish!
Photo Credit: Dogsled Lee Edwin Coursey Flickr via Compfight cc
Photo Credit: Cyclists realjv Flickr via Compfight cc
