The NaNoWriMo Support System you really need

Guillemin, Italian Peasant Girls at Prayer

A couple days ago, I received one of the most touching notes I could imagine. A friend--not a writer, but a fellow lover of books--wrote to ask if I'd be attempting NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) again this year. If I was, she added, could she pray for my success in the endeavor?

I tell you, my eyes were swimming. You writers know that the real enemy is not writer's block or plot problems or clunky keyboards. The real enemy is resistance...in the form of self doubt, nasty inner editors, the fear of failure--and a million other forms, all equally insidious. How can we hope to fight against an enemy like that without Divine help?

I wrote back to my friend and told her I'd be actively revising an old NaNoWriMo project this fall, since I need to get some projects back out into the query world before chasing any shiny new ideas. First drafts are fun for me--revision, at this point, is grueling. I asked her if she would pray as I tried a new scheduling tactic: three hours of active revision--alone--at my parents' house every Saturday, rather than trying to squeeze deep work into an impossible short time every morning before the kiddos wake up.

I'm afraid I woke my parents up as I tiptoed into their house this morning to get started...but whether it was smart scheduling or purely the power of prayer backing me up, I wrote a solid fifteen pages. In two hours. New pages, as this revision involves a massive change of POV and style (basically my old drafts are very detailed outlines at this point).

Gratitude for the time and for the support my friend showed with her encouragement, her confidence in me, and her prayers is still overflowing my heart. (Thank you, thank you, dear friend, if you read this!)

Are any of you attempting NaNoWriMo this year? And if so, can I pray for you? I tell you, it works better than caffeine. ;)

You all have so many beautiful stories inside of you, and I can't wait to read them!