AcWriMo

Maybe you've heard of NaNoWriMo -- "national novel writing month," which is a challenge to write a whole novel (of 50,000 words or more) in the month of November.

Some academics/grad students have tried to figure out a way to make this work (I was interested in it a couple years ago) and the consensus seems to have settled on "AcWriMo" or "Academic Writing Month."

This comes at a crucial time for me so I am going to try it out, but I don't have a strategy yet.

Here are some relevant pieces thinking about how to do this:

My condensed explanation of the 'rules,' a longer version of which is at  PhD to Published:

Here are the rules for #AcWriMo 2012:
1. Set yourself some crazy goals.
2. Publicly declare your participation and goals.
3. Draft a strategy.
4. Discuss what you’re doing. [OK so being on Twitter and Facebook with us all day isn’t acceptable – you’ve got work to do – but checking-in at certain times is imperative!]
5. Don’t slack off.  ‘Write like there’s no December!’
6. Publicly declare your results – and please be honest! 

The Thesis Whisperer explains why AcWriMo sounds kind of bad, but might be good:

Firstly #acwrimo encourages you to make a schedule; to put aside time to work on your writing and declare it a distraction free zone from social media and email. 

Consistent writing, such as #acwrimo encourages, is the only cure I know for perfectionism. The more you write the more ideas you generate and the less time you have to pointlessly polish the words you already have. 

Finally, by joining a global community and keeping in touch with other writers via #acwrimo on Twitter, or by following the PhD2published blog, you will increase your own personal learning network and connections.  

So I am choosing to see #acwrimo as a way to resist and give myself the gift of time to write because I genuinely enjoy it, not because I have a specific word count or goal in mind.