Sit Up Straight (An Encouragement Parody of 'Everybody's Free to Wear Sunscreen')

Disclaimer: a shameless parody from "Everybody’s Free (to wear sunscreen)" by Mary Schmich. This was written last year, and I was requested to post it again this year. So the following piece has been slightly modified and reposted. Permission granted to repost, print and spread else where, just please give credit.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the NaNoWrMo 2007... sit up straight.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sitting up straight would be it. The long term benefits of sitting up straight have been proven by countless NaNo-ers while the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own oddball experience.

I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the deadline and the fervor of November. Never mind. You will not truly appreciate its power to inspire and compel until December has arrived. But trust me, in June ’08, you’ll look back at on the memory and recall in a way you can’t grasp now how many words you were capable of writing, and how much you learned.

You are MORE capable than you imagine.

Don’t worry about the plot; or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to convince your characters why you want them to go down the bloody rabbit hole. The real interesting parts in your story are likely to be things that never crossed your worried mind; the kind that appear to you at 2 am on the last day.

Ignore your internal critic.

SAVE.

Don’t be cruel to other people’s ideas, don’t put up with people who are cruel with yours.

Eat.

Don’t waste your time worrying about the word count; sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind. The race is long, and in the end, it’s only with yourself.

Remember the encouragements, forget the negative comments; if you succeed in doing this, do tell me how.

Keep your old ideas, but throw away your old Mary-Sue plots.

STRETCH.

Don’t panic if you don’t know what you want to write for November. Many of the most interesting writers I met didn’t know at the beginning of the month what they wanted to write; some of the most interesting winners still didn’t know the last week.

Do not edit as you write.

Be kind to your wrists, you’ll miss them when they’re gone.

Maybe you’ll win, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll get publish, maybe you won’t, maybe you’ll edit in one turn, maybe you’ll rip the story apart and go drown your sorrows in chocolate. Whatever you do, don’t congratulate yourself too much or berate yourself, either. You already did the hardest step, trying.

Enjoy your creativity, use it every way you can. Don’t be afraid of your ideas, or what other people think of them, your creativity is the greatest tool you’ll ever have.

WRITE. Even if you have nowhere to do it but in your own bathroom.

Read the forums, but remember you’re here to write.

Do NOT say this is impossible, if it was, we won’t be here.

Get to know your muse, you never know when they’ll decide to take a break.

Be nice to your friends; they are your best link for making sure you have plenty of caffeine and chocolate.

Understand that ideas come and go, but except for the precious few that you are able to use. Record the unused ones for while you may not used this month there are plenty other times they will help you over an another obstacle.

Visit the This-is-Going-Better-Than-I’d-Hope, but leave before it makes you depressed; drop into NaNoWriMo-Ate-My-Soul, but leave before it makes you apathetic.

Relax.

Accept certain inalienable truths, characters misbehave, computers crash, and time slips away, or later you’ll fantasize about a time when time used to go slowly, computers behaved and characters listened to their writers.

Remember to sleep.

Don’t be afraid to turn to the forums for support. Maybe you will have an idea, maybe you'll have a plot; but you never know when either one might run out.

Don’t stress out about life matters, it will all get done, I promise you.

Be careful of advice you accept, but, be patient with us who dispense it. Advice is like rapidly explaining a detailed map of a difficult state to someone who is trying to apply it in another country. Every writer is different.

But trust me on the sitting up straight

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2005: Phoenix's Equilibrium (Fin! Won!)- historical fiction
2006: Thorns of a Child's Rose (Fin! Won!)- crime drama
2007: Slipping Through the Cracks (Fin!-Barely Won!)- fantasy
Current Project: Editing a co-written story