Some cheesy motivational speaker said this once, but it is true. I have fallen out of habit with writing. At this time last year, I decided to write a post a day under the guise of a mini-series called “What I Learned Today…”. For more than a month, I wrote about the little things I learned from new words to rocks to personal nuances. It was a healthy dose of setting goals and habits that lasted for the remainder year.
I’m at that crux again. I need to kick-start my routine of writing. I have a goal to semi-participate in NaNoWriMo in November. But I’m not going at it without a plan. In the next few months, I will be creating a detailed outline with major plot points, character bios and setting details. The “semi-participate” means that I’m not holding to the start date timing. If I feel like writing parts of it now, I will. My goal is to have everything ready before November 1 and finish a draft of a novel by the end of November.
Lofty goal I know, but if 30,000 out of 200,000 finished a novel in one month just last year, I feel like I can do it too.
Karmic Life 
I’m not so sure I think NaNoWritMo is a good thing overall. The impulse to finish a work is crucial of course, and sometimes to do so above all other concerns may be what is needed, but I worry that a lot of people slap something together over thirty days that will inevitably forever remain unrevised first-draft mediocrity rather than take the time to properly construct and rewrite something that will be with them forever. I like your longterm planning of using the NaNoWritMo date as a (somewhat) arbitrary deadline and motivator, without accepting the limitations that come with full participation. Seems much more likely to produce work of substance.
I need deadlines, but I really want to put the time into it. I want to be realistic too. If I am starting the research, there are times I want to write a bit here or there of actual plot, not just characters and scenery. With all of the research and planning, I hope to be able to tie it all together. Fingers crossed.