New Year's Resolutions

I don't believe in New Year's resolutions. It seems silly to only look at ways to improve your life once a year. Plus, these resolutions tend to be too general to effectively act on them. I.E., 'work out more' can be anything, but 'work out twice a week' is specific enough to take action. And then, it becomes a goal.

I do believe in goals. I have lots of them, and I revisit them throughout the year to make sure I'm on task, or to readjust what I need to. I also look back on the year to see how well I did meeting my goals, or at least taking steps toward meeting them.

I'm making a new list of goals for the year, so I thought I'd share some of them with you.

Read 100 books.
I read 67 books last year, which is considerably less than the last two years. Granted, this year was far busier, but I'm convinced I can manage my time better and read more books. There are so many great ones out there!! And I'm going to start with the enormous stack next to my bed. :)

Comment and visit other blogs at least once a week.
I felt a bit like a hermit this year, sequestered away in my corner of the world. I managed to keep my blog posts going, but I didn't get the chance to reply to comments very well. Some months were busier than others, and I did SO many revisions this year it's insane. Still, I can take one day out of the week to comment on my own blog, and other great ones around the blogosphere. I miss you guys. :)

Finish my new WIPs.
On top of all the revisions I did this year, I also finished a first draft of two new WIPs. I'd like to revise and polish them up this year, then get started on the next book in the queue.

Keep up with my karate training.
I joined a dojo last year, and have been loving every part of my training. I have my yellow belt, which is about a third of the way to black belt. I'd like to get halfway there by the end of the year.

That's pretty much it for me. What are your goals for the year?

Resolutions Shmesolutions

I've never been one for New Year's resolutions. I just don't understand the point of waiting until the start of a new year to make changes in my life. I understand the whole new-year-new-leaf concept, but I would rather turn over that new leaf when it needs to be turned rather than wait for the new year.

So, this post is not going to contain a list of writing resolutions. Mostly because I already have an ongoing list of resolutions, which I started years ago. And it has done wonders for helping me become a better writer.

Instead, this post is going to focus on goals (which are directly linked to those ongoing resolutions): goals I set last year, and goals I want to set for this year.

One year ago, I set myself a pretty aggressive goal to get an agent before 2010. I met that goal, but I didn't do it by crossing my fingers and submitting to everyone I could find. I could have done that, and maybe I still would have found my agent. But I would have been relying heavily on luck. Plus, 'maybe' has never been good enough for me. I wanted to sign with an agent, and luck isn't often my friend. So I had to find a method that would keep my progress moving forward, getting me closer and closer to my goal.

The only method I knew of was to make my writing so good that no one would be able to say no. And the best way I know of to improve my writing is to constantly re-evaluate my work, my writing process, my viewpoints, my short-term goals, and what I think I know.

Let me say that last bit again. The best way to improve my writing was to re-evaluate what I thought I knew.

Almost two years ago, I started this blog as a means to test my knowledge on writing. I felt that if I could explain what I knew to other people, that meant I had a firm grasp of the concepts. I still hold to that philosophy. But, last year, I took it a step further. Did I really understand as much as I thought I did? And, how could I expand that knowledge and understanding? I challenged myself with these questions again and again, determined to learn as much as physically possible...and then learn more.

So, I read over a hundred books last year, breaking down each one and analyzing the story. What worked for me? What didn't? Why? I recorded these thoughts in a journal, and applied what I'd learned to my own work. And, yes, I always learned something, even if it was so small it was almost insignificant.

I also read author, agent, and editor blogs to get more insight into the publishing process. I interviewed authors to learn about their writing processes, as well as how they got their books on the shelves.

Everything I did last year had a purpose. Every. Single. Thing. And everything I do this year will have a purpose. Everything, no matter how small it is. And I will constantly evaluate each action, assessing whether or not it is bringing me closer to my goals.

So, if you are feeling energized by what the new year might bring you, harness that energy and set yourself some goals that will keep your energy stoked. But don't stop there. Evaluate those goals constantly, and make sure you are taking steps toward them. If you need to change a goal, don't consider it a failure. You are simply moving in a different, and likely better, direction.

When next year rolls around, you might be surprised at how far you've come. :)

Realistic Goals, or Why You Shouldn’t Swallow Things Whole

This past July, Laurie Halse Anderson challenged her blog readers to write for fifteen minutes every day. I thought this was genius. Fifteen minutes is nothing. A drop in the bucket. You can squeeze that in at lunch time. Or your kid’s nap time. Or right before bed. Or first thing in the morning.

But that’s not why I think her fifteen minute challenge is genius. It’s genius because it gets us sitting down, ready to work. And once we’re sitting, we often do MORE than fifteen minutes. Because, you know, we’re already sitting so we may as well keep going.

That got me thinking about goals in general. When I was growing up, goals were always defined as some big think you work toward. But there was never any detail between START and FINISH. No rules. No guidelines. Just, here’s the goal, now find a way to get there. As a result, I did a lot of flailing early on in my life. There were things I really wanted, like a college degree and still make writing a big part of my life, but no one was there to help me figure out how to get them. I took a lot of wrong roads, learned a lot of things the hard way, but managed to get my degree and then collapse in a heap.

At that point in my life, I was attacking goals with a full-on vengeance. Kind of like shoving an entire steak into your mouth. If I had known what I was doing, I’d have thought to actually cut the steak into chewable pieces, then slowly work my way through it. And, if I got full, I could set it aside until I was ready to come back to it. But I didn’t know I could do that back then.

I think that if I’d known more about goals, and effective ways of reaching them, I wouldn’t have been so exhausted once I’d attained this particular goal. Laurie’s method of fifteen minutes per day illustrates a more effective use of attaining goals.

A good friend of mine, Lori Howard, is also a genius goal-setter. She can take any goal and break it down into manageable chunks. She has written a five-day set of steps which will get you on the road toward obtaining any goal you want. It’s brilliant, and I highly recommend reading it.

Since I’m a planner and goal-setter by nature, all of this rang true for me. But I’m curious, what about those who aren’t natural planners or goal-setters? Do you create a path based on what pops into your head each morning? Do you just wander along the path and see what comes up? Or do you have a destination in mind? Inquiring minds want to know!