By now, you have been planning, researching and writing your book for twelve days. You might be beginning to find your motivation waning or the idea for writing starting to fail you. Now is a good time to take a short break from writing your book. Taking a short break is not going to kill your manuscript or your momentum. In many instances, it is just what you need to fuel even more ideas and to prevent writer's block from creeping in and damaging your productivity.
Taking a day off from writing might cause you to fall behind on your preferred word count, but it is only a day's worth of writing that you will fall behind on and, with your creativity and motivation renewed by a day of rest, it will be a simple matter to catch up on that missed day of writing in the days ahead.
Taking a day off from writing doesn't mean that you only take a break from writing; it also means you take a break from other writing-related tasks, such as researching your book, working on the plot structure or outline of your book and even planning the next scene in your head. A day off from writing means taking a complete break from your book.
Use the day off to experience things away from your desk or computer. Go on a picnic with your family. Go see a movie that you've been wanting to see. Go out to dinner with your significant other or a good friend. Spend a day cooking up some of your favorite dishes. Go on a hike somewhere pretty and lush with nature. Go volunteer at a shelter, soup kitchen or food bank for the day. Take your kids to the aquarium or spend a day at the beach with family and friends. Go swimming. Spend time working out at the gym. Read a book you've been wanting to read for ages. Take a luxurious bubble bath. Go for a massage or spend the day at a health spa.
Spend the day refreshing your mind, relaxing and pampering yourself. Feel yourself living in the moment. Then, a day later, when you get back to your writing and working on your book, the ideas will flow and your creative muse will be just as refreshed as the rest of you.
unfortunately I did not take a day off, I decided to do the campnanowrimo marathon and what an energy draining and unproductive exercise in futility that was. So I am dragging myself through the day with absolutely no energy and will bed down early to try again tomorrow. :)
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