The goal of  National Novel Writing Month is to write 50,000 words in a month. If you’re like me, for whatever reason, that didn’t happen.

Usually, this would be a post about my monthly WIP update, but given the subject, I’ve decided to branch out and make this post a little more inclusive. I know I’m not the only one feeling post-NaNo blues.

So what happened?

Maybe you worked hard, but just couldn’t reach it in time. Maybe uncontrollable factors got in the way. Maybe you started off great but couldn’t keep up the pace. Maybe you didn’t try.

Guess what?

That’s okay.

Sure it doesn’t feel okay…and thanks to NaNo’s little graphs it probably doesn’t look okay either. Mine looks like I took a snooze halfway up Everest and froze to death:

And that’s okay.

Writing isn’t contained to one month of the year. It’s constant.

So you fluffed November. No biggie. Another month has begun, and the words written in December matter just as much. It takes as long as it takes.

We’re writers. We persevere.

With that in mind, look at something positive that came out of Novemeber, whether you participated in NaNoWriMo or not. What’s your word count? Is it more than it was before November, even if it’s just a single word? That’s progress.

I wrote 27,000 words this month. That’s more than double my average, which is 11,000.

It’s not 50,000, not even close. But its progress.

Maybe you wrote more than me, maybe you wrote less. Even if you wrote nothing, just remember that in the grand scheme of things NaNoWriMo doesn’t matter. December has begun. Get writing.