By Lacey Gunter
I have heard several differing opinions about the good and bad of NaNoWriMo. Since I have never participated myself, I do not know how useful it is. I have, however, participated in PiBoIdMo - Picture Book Idea Month - for the past two years and I can tell you it has been immensely helpful.
The best thing about PiBoIdMo is that it keeps me writing year round. I am a much better writer when I am consistently practicing the craft of writing. This is a far easier task to accomplish when I have a well of ideas I can just draw from, than when I am just shooting from the hip. If nothing else, I can look over my list of ideas and that alone will get my creative juices flowing much quicker than when I don't.
Just this week, eight months after PiBoIdMo, I started another picture book that was based on one of my PiBoIdMo ideas. Not every book I have written since last November has been a PiBoIdMo idea, but nearly all of them have. Without those ideas I do not think I would be able to achieve my writing goals for the year.
Another great thing about PiBoIdMo is that you are coming up with many more ideas than you could possibly write in a year. So it is not nearly as hard to feel pretty successful at PiBoIdMo as I imagine it is with NaNoWriMo. You only have to be on top of your game 1/4 to 1/3 of the time to have an entire years worth of good ideas.
Then there are also the obvious benefits of comradery and building connections and friendships. I have reaped these benefits too.
Hmmm . . . As I have been writing this blog post and thinking about PiBoIdMo it has even got my creative juices flowing and thinking about how to solve another writing problem I have, ideas for blog posts. I think this year as I do PiBoIdMo, maybe I will do a BlogIdMo too. Perhaps then I will be writing beautifully year round, both online and off. I can hardly wait!
I have heard several differing opinions about the good and bad of NaNoWriMo. Since I have never participated myself, I do not know how useful it is. I have, however, participated in PiBoIdMo - Picture Book Idea Month - for the past two years and I can tell you it has been immensely helpful.
The best thing about PiBoIdMo is that it keeps me writing year round. I am a much better writer when I am consistently practicing the craft of writing. This is a far easier task to accomplish when I have a well of ideas I can just draw from, than when I am just shooting from the hip. If nothing else, I can look over my list of ideas and that alone will get my creative juices flowing much quicker than when I don't.
Just this week, eight months after PiBoIdMo, I started another picture book that was based on one of my PiBoIdMo ideas. Not every book I have written since last November has been a PiBoIdMo idea, but nearly all of them have. Without those ideas I do not think I would be able to achieve my writing goals for the year.
Another great thing about PiBoIdMo is that you are coming up with many more ideas than you could possibly write in a year. So it is not nearly as hard to feel pretty successful at PiBoIdMo as I imagine it is with NaNoWriMo. You only have to be on top of your game 1/4 to 1/3 of the time to have an entire years worth of good ideas.
Then there are also the obvious benefits of comradery and building connections and friendships. I have reaped these benefits too.
Hmmm . . . As I have been writing this blog post and thinking about PiBoIdMo it has even got my creative juices flowing and thinking about how to solve another writing problem I have, ideas for blog posts. I think this year as I do PiBoIdMo, maybe I will do a BlogIdMo too. Perhaps then I will be writing beautifully year round, both online and off. I can hardly wait!
That sounds like a fantastic idea! I should definitely try the blog idea thing. Sometimes I just stare blankly at the screen. :)
ReplyDeleteI've recently tried this on a slightly different scale a little bit, and it has been great for me too.
BlogIdMo- genius. I'm in. ;-)
ReplyDelete