Is National Novel Writing Month the problem or a symptom
 It amazes me the clarity a headache can sometimes give you. My sinuses and I are at war today in this dry autumn air. As a result, I don't have the level of patience that I usually would have.
When I got up today, I went over my schedule to organize my workflow for the day. Since I decided to take part in National Novel Writing Month, high on my list was to hit my word count for the day. That is not what I wanted to do.
As the resistance mounted against me, I focused my attention on why I didn't want to write.
That was just the thing. My problem isn't that I don't want to write. The problem is I want to play in the setting. I want to explore, frolicking in all the nooks and crannies that the world presents me. So, in reality, it is not that I don't want to write, it is yet again the constraints of the novel are working against the kind of story I want to tell.
Over and over, I tell myself that I'm going to break out of the mold of the novel, and time and again I force myself back into it. It is comfortable, familiar. I know how to do that, and as such it is the easy way out.
I have to stop taking the easy way out.
So, for me, National Novel Writing Month is both the problem and the symptom. I'm not writing a novel, so why am I trying to make it fit the format? I need to refocus, and plan my way forward. Something different is trying to be born through me. I just need to get out of its way.