cold feet?

[skepanie.livejournal.com]

this will be my second year participating in NaNo, but something is different for me this year. I keep seeing everybody talk about how excited they are, which is great, but I am not excited at all. in fact, I'm dreading it it a lot. you see, I won last year, but it was incredibly painful and made me kind of miserable for the entire month. I expected to have fun, but it was mostly just annoying. I am not sure if this is because of my extensive over-planning (my plan consisted of an Excel character map and an 8,000 word story plan), which is possibly what made the story so boring to me that I wanted to kill them all (and perhaps that was why I found it so difficult and annoying), or if it's because I am just not into writing a lot in a short period of time and therefore should not put myself through this again.

right now, I'm planning on participating and planning out my story with a LOT less detail, but I really don't know if participating at all is a good idea. I think the only thing I'm clinging to is the novel I will ostensibly have at the end of the month.

so, I was hoping you guys could offer some perspective. has anybody else experienced similar feelings of dread and avoidance before November even comes around? have any of you made yourselves miserable by over-planning, and if so, was it more fun the next year when you didn't plan so much? most importantly, should I expect similar misery this November, or is it possible this will be fun for me in some way?

EDIT: thanks for all the great advice, everyone! I feel better about this now, and I think I will try not writing down any plans at all this time around. and if that doesn't work, I will try this "quitting" thing everyone is talking about. :)