NaNoTryMo – why 15 minutes a day isn’t failure

A friend of mine tweeted this take on NaNoWriMo: NaNoTryMo. I had to steal it, because it sums up my approach to the challenge this year (thank you, Amelinda!) . I also had to steal these wise words from Winston Churchill as it is my inspiration this month:

The NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) goal is to write 50,000 words in a month, which equates to roughly 1,666 per day. I have deep respect for writers who achieve this, or even aim for it but I knew there was absolutely no way that was going to work for me this month. However, I needed to find a way to get back into my work-in-progress, so I rethought the word count goal and shared about it with my friends over at the SCBWI Canada East blog. These days, my goal is a slice of time not a word count and I believe it will make a difference. 15 minutes might sound like failure. It sure did to me at first. But failure isn’t fatal.

How do you keep writing when self-doubt rears its head? Please share your strategies below, I know most writers would benefit!