Ever since Nanowrimo, I’ve been trying to finish my manuscript. By “trying to finish,” I really mean thinking a lot about how I should be writing, but not actually doing a lot of writing. The fact that I have left a manuscript unfinished just adds to my guilt that, despite my best and reoccuring intentions, I never manage to keep up the level of writing I do in November once the month is over.

I always intend to. I always say “I can do it during November, so clearly it’s possible—I just have to keep this up every day!” Yeah, right. I realize real authors are supposed to write every day. I realize it, and I want to be that person. But consistently, I’m not.

My new goal (yes, more goals) is to at least touch one of my projects every day. It’s ok if that just means opening the document and staring at it for awhile. It’s ok if all I do is make some world-building notes. Because once I’m on that document, I’ve made the big first step towards actually working on it. I can trust that most days, I’ll end up actually getting something done.

If there’s anything I’ve learned from doing Nanowrimo for the last six years, is that once you stop a project, it gets really hard to pick it up again. Days go by. Weeks. Months. And finally, years. Now it’s just a half-finished document somewhere, and your writing style and skills have changed so much that in order to “get back to it,” you basically have to start all over again.

So, that’s my goal. Not a word count or a scene count or a set number of hours in my desk chair. Just opening a document, and seeing what happens.