A new season brings us a new Autumn RP Challenge: Fall in Love! Maybe you can check something off both lists—accepting and completing one task that applies for the Guild and RP challenges!

A topic that's come up more than once here at the Writing & Roleplaying Guild, especially this time of year, is... National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)! October is an excellent time to start thinking about joining the challenge in November. We all have writing goals (that's why we're here!), and we all want to find new ways to make progress on them. Perhaps a 30-day event like NaNoWriMo is what's necessary to develop those daily writing skills or push ourselves to overcome writer's block or uncertainty!

A tip for accomplishing goals, whether they are writing-related or not, involves:
• clearly articulating goals in a written, visible format
• breaking larger goals into smaller concrete tasks
• asking yourself, daily, about what progress you've made

One form that this can take is a "Writer's Contract", for the purposes of this Challenge, a "Writer & Roleplayer's Contract". Why do you write and/or roleplay? What are you working towards? In a month, in a year, in 5 years... where do you want to be? Put those thoughts and feelings into words (we're writers, after all!) and then reference them. Remind yourself why you're trying to make these changes. Find ways to work towards achieving those goals by not losing sight of what your goals are!

What is a challenge?
A challenge is an objective (or objectives) that a single Writing and Roleplaying Guild member strives to attain, based on the outlined criteria. This is not a competition against others—your only rival is yourself.
Find out more about Writing and Roleplaying Guild challenges: Guild Challenges, Contests, and Games!

What counts as a "contract" for this Challenge?
Write a personal manifesto for your writing & roleplaying goals.

They can be goals for the month, goals for the next month, goals for the far future—as long as you commit some work to these goals during the month of October. Who do you want to be, as a writer and/or roleplayer? When you think about that future version of yourself, what steps had to be taken to get there?

Here's an example of a NaNoWriMo contract, to give you an idea!

What are the requirements for this challenge?
Hold yourself writing- and roleplaying-accountable for October with a contract!

• Are you working on a story? What are some goals you have for that story? What do you need to do to make progress towards those goals in general—and how can you do it in October?
  
• Are you trying to improve a specific writing skill? Are there resources you should be reading or practice you should be attempting?
  
• Are you aiming to improve your activity or quality in roleplaying? Should you be committing to posting a particular number of times a week? Should you be keeping in contact with the other RPers in your game, so the momentum stays fresh?
  
• Are you hoping to be published? Do you need to send out your manuscript, or perhaps adjust the formatting? Do you need to research publishing houses? Can you divide this into daily or weekly tasks?
  

You are not required to share the exact words of your contract in the thread; if you want to keep it private, you may! The contract is ultimately between you and your future self. You can simply describe it in more general terms here if you'd like.

How do I participate in the challenge?
There are several ways to participate!

• Post in this thread with your contract or intent to write a contract for this month.
  
• Discuss the challenge in this thread.
  
• Request feedback on your own goals in this thread.
  
• Provide feedback* on someone else's goals or ideas (who has requested it) in this thread.
  *Do not provide feedback if the author has not requested it. Doing so will disqualify you from this challenge.
  

How do I complete the challenge?
Post in this thread with your contract status and follow up on how well you followed that contract before EOD Wednesday, October 31st with your results!