From Our Young Writers: The Struggle of Writing as an Extrovert

In addition to the main event every November, NaNoWriMo provides free creative writing resources to educators and young participants around the world through our Young Writers Program. This month, we’ve asked some of our young writers to share their own words of wisdom. Today, participant Lily Dodd shares her tips on how to write a novel and have a social life at the same time:

My one* problem with writing is that it’s pretty isolating. This is partially my fault. I do not enjoy writing in front of people. I can’t write on public transportation. They’re looking, I think of my anonymous seatmates, who literally could not give a flying flapjack about what’s in my notebook.

Writing in high school was especially tough for me. I cared much more about hanging out with my friends than I did about writing the Great American Novel– which was great. I have no regrets about focusing more on my social life than on my writing. Actually, I’m not sure why I put that in past tense. I still prioritize my friends over my writing. But truly great moments come when the two are combined.

When I was fifteen, I was named a finalist in Fiction Writing by the National YoungArts Foundation. The reward was a trip to Miami for a week with about 170 other young people across artistic disciplines. It’s possible that I’ve never had more fun than I did that week. I was writing like crazy. I was getting better every day. And I was constantly surrounded by people.

“‘See?’ I told myself. ‘You can be social and writing at the same time!’”

I had a mad crush on a cute photographer. I ate with a group of music boys who somehow managed to include and immerse me in a conversation about contemporary string quartets. One of the dancers I saw at dinner every night went on to win So You Think You Can Dance. I was inspired by everyone, not just the writers. Simply being in that environment did enormous good for my creativity, my motivation, and my general well-being. “See?” I told myself. “You can be social and writing at the same time!”

YoungArts was an unusual experience and impossible for me to perfectly replicate in my daily life. But I figured out other ways to incorporate people into my writing world. My junior and senior year, I wrote one act plays for my high school’s annual festival. This meant meeting with the directors and actors, all of whom were friends.

I also took to writing in coffee shops. You talk to someone when you get there. You sit next to other people, but typically far away enough that you don’t feel exposed. The drawbacks are cost and time—now that I work in a café I know how annoying it is when one person has been typing for six hours and you’re trying to turn tables over.

A lot of people don’t have a problem with working alone. But for those of us who do, I think it’s important to recognize that writing doesn’t have to be super isolating all the time. I’m still looking for ways to feel like a participant in the actual world while creating my own worlds. I’m also pretty sure I’m going to drop a lot of money on jasmine tea this November.

*Other problems include: procrastination, excessive tea making and consumption, long periods of mental blankness, and feeling like my computer screen has seared itself into my eyeballs.

Lily Dodd is currently on a gap year adventure. She enjoys chill people, comedy television, and nature (very vague). She has won several national awards for her writing, including one in 2014 from the National YoungArts Foundation. You can read her story “A Eulogy for Pretzel” in One Teen Story Magazine, or listen to it on Audible.com (!!!!!!). Lily’s novel for NaNoWriMo 2016 is called Sherwood. She really wants to finish it. She telling you that because she read somewhere that if you write down your goals, they are more likely to happen.

Top photo by Flickr user Hans Splinter.