A Shift in Focus

Thus far, November has been an interesting month. I heaved a sigh of relief last week that the 2012 Presidential campaign finally came to an end, which also meant an end to the flood of campaign commercials. Living in New York City, the local networks play ads for New York candidates, New Jersey candidates, and Connecticut candidates. I’m so glad I won’t see those people’s names or faces for a little while. And, I’m certain I speak for a lot of political junkies when I say I’m quickly reaching the point where I hate all politicians and all political parties equally. The Citizens United decision was a fiasco, and it’s time for a Constitutional change that outlaws the SuperPACs and corporations buying elections.

But, I digress. Politics is absolutely the last thing I wish to discuss this week. Instead, I’m looking at a shift in focus as a writer in my creative work. This shift was prompted by my attempt to participate in NaNoWriMo again this year. I’ve tried this in the past, typically with dismal results. This year, sadly, was no different. I quickly found myself behind in the word count by the first weekend. A 2-day migraine this past week ensured that I won’t be catching up this month.

Between NaNoWriMo and a mystery writing class I took about a decade ago, I have a few different novels in various stages knocking around in a drawer. Slowly, the idea is dawning that writing a novel may not be the right move for me as a writer at this stage of my career. I recently saw a suggestion for poets to try writing a poem a day for a poetic version of NaNoWriMo, and somehow that project seems more attainable than cranking out 50,000 words in 30 days does. Therefore, I’m going to shift focus starting tomorrow morning and work on writing a poem a day until mid-December.

What challenges have you attempted recently? How did they turn out? If you weren’t successful, how can you reshape the challenge so that it’s more attainable?