If you're taking a pause from writing your NaNoWriMo novel to read this, I'd like you to imagine me gently closing your laptop down over your hands, or taking your pencil away from you, forcibly prying it from your hands if necessary. I'm telling you that it's OK to quit writing your novel.

First of all, let's just admit it: you weren't going to write that whole thing anyway. Novel writing is hard! And doing it all in a month! Forget about it. Come on! Writing a sentence a day is reasonable but 1667 words a day? How is there that much to write every day. Just be proud of yourself for just trying, or even thinking of trying. There are so many other things to do than write, and you know it. Just do those things, they're more fun both in the short and long term. Instead of writing and taking a break every now and then to wrap your hands around a hot mug of coffee and stare out the window to get inspiration, why don't you just quit the writing and look full-time? You know that's the best part.

Secondly, your novel is probably pretty bad.

Thirdly, it's not going to get you anywhere. How many classics or bestsellers were written during NaNoWriMo? Do you think Herman Melville was like "OMG WTF I'm totes going to write a novel in November lol!" Could a classic/bestseller conceivably come from your NaNoWriMo project? Of course not, stop thinking about that. Stop thinking about it! STOP RIGHT NOW. GO GET A SCONE.You'd be better off starting a funny Twitter account and making a book from that.

I am NOT telling you this because I'm jealous that you apparently are so prolific and dedicated and inspired that you can knock out a whole novel in a month. Or because I'm bitter that apparently my rate of writing books is once a decade. Or that I just don't want to hear about how this is all coming so easy to you so just shut your stupid mouth.

No I'm telling you this as a professional writer. This professional personal advice is definitely more valuable than any sort of national inspirational novel-writing initiative so just take it from me: slow down, stop writing so fast, stop writing at all, and stop having any fun. Just leave it to us, the professionals, so we can bitch and moan about it being so hard without you making it look so easy.