Good Morning Everyone,

Since there isn’t a change in my current reads, I will not be doing a WWW Wednesday post this week.

Instead, I’ll be sharing some exciting news with you!

In about a week and a half, I’ll be taking my first self-imposed writer’s retreat! Yay!

Why A Writer’s Retreat?

As you probably know, I’ve been working on my sequel to Reaper basically since I got here on WordPress (April 2019). While I’ve written nearly 40,000 words so far (about 160 pages worth) in the past six months, I have been somewhat disappointed with the quickness in which I am completing this project.

While I’m certainly not trying to pressure myself into writing this book quicker (that never works out), I feel like I need to get away from Kansas City and hit the reset button so I can recharge my creative batteries while getting some much needed writing time in without any distractions.

In general, I feel like I’ve been burning out on normal life things as well. I feel like I’m in a constant battle with time and am feeling the pressure to get things done. This could also stem from the fact that I haven’t had a decent vacation since March when I went to Denver. I’m a perfectionist, and without a decent vacation to remind me that I can slow down, I tend to bite off more than I can chew.

Typically, I prefer to take at least two trips a year, hopefully three, for at least 4-5 days, but due to paying off my credit card bills this summer, I haven’t really been able to save up much money or go anywhere/spoil myself.

Hence the need for a writer’s retreat. A writer’s retreat is a great way to get some much needed work done on a novel that you’re writing, while low key being a vacation of sorts. I’ve always heard of writers going on these, so I decided that this was a really good option for me a couple months back.

Where Am I Going?

When I was trying to decide where I wanted to go, there were several things I wanted to keep in mind.

1. Money – Having just recovered from paying off my credit card bills, I had pretty much no money to my name. I didn’t want to spend too much money, so somewhere that is going through an off season seemed best if I wanted a good deal.

2. Location– I wanted to go somewhere rural, more remote. Somewhere where nature is present and I could take some walks by myself and enjoy the scenery.

3. Distance – As much as I love travelling far and wide across the United States, this time I actually wanted to stay relatively close, within several hours of Kansas City, but far enough away to leave the city behind and just relax. Being able to drive to my destination was pretty important this time around.

So where did I decide to go?

… Branson, Missouri!

Branson is well-known for its live entertainment, its amusement park Silver Dollar City, and the beautiful outdoors. It’s also where the famous Netflix show Ozark was filmed.

My Plans

I’ll be staying in Branson from 11/10/19, leaving 11/14/19 (it was originally 11/13/19, but I got another day off for extra peace of mind).

In a nutshell, I don’t really plan on treating this like a standard vacation. I typically visit points of interest and get to know a city inside and out.

As much as I enjoy doing that, with this being a writer’s retreat the focus will be on mental health and getting some writing done.

I will say, I’ll probably spend a few hours at Silver Dollar City, being the amusement park junkie that I am, but other than that I’m looking forward to some quiet time.

So while I’m not setting an actual writing goal for this trip, I will hope to get somewhere around 10k words done (40 pages), maybe more.

In the coming week and a half, my focus will be a bit less on word count (though I am still writing, promise!), and more on prepping myself for this retreat.

The remainder of my Act II for the Reaper Sequel is technically plotted out, but very loosely. I would like to plot things out a little bit more closely to get a good idea of what will work so that when I am writing, I’ll be going at a steady, fast pace.

And that, as they say, is that. Wish me luck on my writing vacation!

That’s A Wrap!

Well, that’s a wrap! I’m super excited about my writer’s retreat, but how about you?

Have you ever gone on a writer’s retreat? Where did you go, and what was your experience? Feel free to comment, I’d love to hear all about your experience!

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