: Re: I'm not a great pantser; what kind of preparation do I need for NaNoWriMo? I'm very appreciative of NaNoWriMo's "your first step is writing a crappy first draft" credo, and I like the motivation

@Sent2472441

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I was under the impression that I was a great pantser and had little to say on this matter. Then I realised. All my "pantsed" efforts used to run into the muck about 20k in and many never came back from that terrible limbo.

So when I first sat down to do Nano I was determined to find a method for making sure I made the magic 50k. Here is what I did:

I decided to write a story I thought I would be able to tell without any difficulty at all. In that case a book for young adults about a boy who goes on a magical quest travelling from point A to point B through a fantasy kingdom.

I have never had a problem pantsing since I did that because of what it taught me. It taught me that there is no such thing as a story it's easy to tell. It also taught me that when you're stuck and need to get moving again in a hurry baths were always the answer. Nice hot baths, and quiet, and thinking.

Lie in the hot water and examine the current snarl and get out of that snarl and nothing else. Do not attempt any further planning just sit down again and keep plugging away until the next time you need to hit the on switch on the water heater.

So in summary:

It helps to be telling a classic, archetypal story
Baths give a chance to think
Solve one problem at a time don't be tempted to try to put everything to rights at once.

EDIT: Oh, and it always helps to keep in mind that there is a solution to every story problem. You just have to broaden your thinking about what could happen next. I tended to lie in the bath and think of the most outrageous thing that could happen next, something really credulity stretching and how I might seriously try to sell that to an audience. And then I worked back to a solution which was less outrageous (although, hey, a couple of them actually ended up in the story!) and provided what I hoped were some fresh narrative twists. It's just a question of giving yourself a quick mental sock in the chops.

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