(Late) Goals 2011

So, exactly how much thought did I give my goals for 2011 over the last two days? About five minutes.

Quit laughing.

Actually, I only gave them about five minutes of thought because I already knew what most of them were going to be. I just needed to figure out how to phrase them in the “proper” way. There’s a proper way, you ask. Yes, yes there is.
Goals need to have the five W’s and the H. You learned them in school, and here they’re popping up again.

Who? What? When? Where? Why? And How?

Who: Who is doing this? Is it just you? A family goal? A goal with a business partner?

What: Be specific when making a goal. It shouldn’t be I want to lose weight. It should be I want to lose ten pounds.

When: Give yourself a deadline. Without a deadline, we are more inclined to procrastinate. I want to lose ten pounds by June 1st.

Where: Is not always applicable, but sometimes with the “how” you need a where. Like maybe for a weight loss goal you need a gym.

How: We are more apt to stick with goals if we have a plan. If we leave the goal as just that, it kind of hangs out there—mocking us. Yes, goals can be evil like that. Again, be as specific as possible. I want to lose ten pounds by June 1st by sticking to a 1500 calorie diet and going to the gym three times a week.

I saved “Why” for last because I think it is the most important, and the least thought about. Why are you setting this goal? You feel it is important enough to actually set as a goal, a commitment, but why? Going back to the weight loss, there are many possibilities—health, feel better about how you look, keep up with kids, envy, embarrassment…whatever it is, if you nail the reason, you’ll have that metaphoric yellow, polka-dot bikini.

So, short summary—be specific and go deeper, set deadline and a plan. One more big thing—make sure the goal is attainable, but also challenges you. If it’s too out there, you won’t follow through, and if it’s too easy, either it won’t stick or, again, you won’t follow through.

My goals? So glad you asked…

I want to lose twenty pounds by June 21st (my anniversary), and then another ten by the end of the year. I am going to follow my diabetic diet and walk/workout at least four times a week. I want to lose weight so that I can keep up with my kids and feel better about myself, knowing I’m taking care of me.

I will write at least 500/day, six days a week (excluding Sundays), by using my free time more productively. These words can be my novels, blogs, or articles—as long as it’s something other than emails and Facebook updates. I want to develop a routine that becomes second nature to me so that I can better my craft.

I will follow Flylady.net’s routines to the letter for six months in my home. I am a crazy housekeeper and I need to change my ways so that I’m not embarrassed when someone appears at my door unannounced. Hopefully, by the end of six months, some of it will be ingrained in my thick skull.

Those are my top three. What about you? What are your goals for 2011? Let’s keep each other accountable. I will revisit my goals (and yours) in three months to see where we are and what changes may need to be made.

*GASP* That’s right. You can CHANGE your goals because life sure doesn’t stay the same!

New Year, Really?

You know what happens when you move? If your not careful, you lose all ability to tell time. Yep. I'm sure it's a proven fact. Somewhere. On the web.

So, it occurs to me that it's already 2011 and I really haven't thought much about my goals for the year. I know, I'm SO behind. I mean, I know I want to lose some weight (hello, I'm IN Hawaii). I know I need to finish Dividing Spirits so I can move on the next novel in the series. I know there are probably several other things that I'm forgetting.

Time just gets away from me sometimes. Part of the reason I haven't considered my goals too seriously yet is that I am an organized person (usually), and right now my life is total chaos.

I live in a hotel room with two rambuncious (but cute!) preschoolers, a feisty and demanding seven-month-old, and an equally exhausted and frustrated husband. We don't know what exactly is happening with my husband's job, we're trying to get out of getting screwed over by the housing department, and I'm trying to "manage" the daily stuff like homeschooling, cleaning, writing without all the stuff we're used to having around.

Obviously, I don't thrive in chaos.

Anyway, the best way to beat the blues is to get on top of them. Be proactive. Take and running start and LEAP. Weeeeeeee...and see where you land.

So.

On Friday, come back to see what I come up with for my goals. I'll also probably go ahead and post last year's goal post for those of you who don't know all about "setting goals". There is a formula. It works. Most of the time.

Happy Hump Day! See ya right before the weekend. God bless!

Dare to Dream

It occurs to me this morning that there are only 79 days left in 2010. 79! That’s crazy. Remember those goals we made almost 10 months ago? Yeah…only 79 days left to fulfill those goals. Oy!

Possibly more important than those goals, what have you done to reach your dreams?

Do you know what your dreams are?

Over the next several weeks (until the day after Thanksgiving), I’m going to be focusing on achieving our dreams, no matter how big or small, in most of my Monday/Wednesday/Friday posts. (Tuesdays will still be Get To Know interviews, and Thursday will still be writing related!)

We’re going to prepare to make 2011 the year of dreams come true—Cinderella-style! Okay, maybe not Cinderella-style, but I’m sure she’ll make an appearance.

In the meantime, be thinking on those questions: Do you know what your dreams are? What have you done to reach them? Let your mind wander…

Update

(The girls were flower girls in my good friend and college roommates wedding last weekend.)


Happy Friday!

I apologize that this month's update is coming about kind of late. It slipped my mind that I hadn't posted one yet. That's ok, just more to tell, right?

Well, if you don't already know, my husband received orders last month. We're moving to Hawaii! We are very excited. I am a little sad to be leaving my friends and fellow writers here in Kansas, but military life is a transiate one, and I'm used to it. It's how I end up with friends all over the country.

The move is a quick one. We'll be leaving here the beginning of December, taking about thirty days to visit family, and then arrive in Hawaii either the end of Dec/beginning Jan. You all may think I'm crazy, but I'm going to miss the snow. Yes, I love snow.

The kids are doing fabulous. We started homeschooling in September. If you saw my post the other day, you know that so far it is going pretty well. It's taking me some time to figure out how to get organized for each week and each day, but it hasn't been discouraging. The girls love it though. And they are so smart!

Connor is getting huge! He's in 6-9 month clothing. He's not big by any means, he's just long for his age. A little wiggler, too. He is squealing, cooing, smiling--so entertaining. I think he might be starting to teeth, too. Not sure I'm ready for that. He's starting to grasp toys and play with them. It's fun to watch and interact with him. He has his four month appointment on th 17th. I can hardly believe he's already four months.

Due to life in general, not much writing has taken place over the last month. I don't have time during the day to focus, so editing is kind of out of the question. But, by the time the kids are all in bed, I'm too exhausted to do much of anything. I don't know, though, if I'm going to call myself a writer, I need to start kicking myself in the pants.

My goal for this month is to edit another ten chapters. I know that's not a lot, but it's more than nothing.

What are your goals for October? Oh, and who's going to participate in NaNoWriMo?

Happy Birthday to me!

Yes, it has happened. I turned another year older last Thursday. I reached the ripe old age of 29, at which I will remain for the rest of my adult life. That’s the way it works, right? I had a wonderful week celebrating…from cards and warm wishes from family and friends to the happy homecoming of my husband. Plus, who can forget the cake? Calories don’t count on your birthday, you know.

I think my birthday falls at a great time of the year. May 20th falls just close enough to six months into the year, that as I take time to reflect on my life and my goals, I can take stock on those pesky New Year’s Resolutions I made on January 1st. It’s not always the most pleasurable part of my birthday traditions, but it is a necessary one. After all, without a system of checks and balances, how do we make the system work properly, right?

So, I went back to my blog post in January and reread that exciting, “let’s usher in the new year with passion” post. One thing that I realized right off the bat? I was WAY too perky when I wrote that. It must have been one of my non-morning sickness days. The second thing that occurred to me was that I was either too ambitious in my goals, or life just got in the way more than I intended. Either way, I didn’t accomplish near as much as I had hoped by now.

Here is a copy of my goals:

1. Write 500 words/day except for Sunday/holidays on either manuscript or blogs so that I can get in the habit of writing even without inspiration. I'll keep track of this on a spreadsheet.

Well, this one definitely flew out the window until about two months ago. I don’t think I hardly wrote a thing until April. However, now that morning sickness is over and the girls have been able to get outside and run off some energy, I have more time and, more importantly, energy to write. While I don’t think I’ve quite made it up to 500 words EVERY day. I have been getting better. So I intend to keep this goal the way it is and continue to strive to meet it.

2. Finish DS by the end of February so that I can enter it in the Genesis Contest and submit to MLP (and others).

Well, if I didn’t start writing anything until April, this definitely didn’t happen. If you follow this blog, then you know that although I wanted to work on DS, I was having issues with completing it. I recently did a complete read through, and then had a brainstorming session with a critique friend of mine. She inspired me to get my rear in gear and I actually did my first writing session on the ending of DS the other day. Yay!

Now, my new goal is to finish the rough draft of DS by the time Connor comes and then the final draft by August 31st. Wish me luck!

3. Write the first draft of the sequel to DS by the time the baby comes so I am not stressed about getting it on paper and can relax and edit.

Yeah, read number two.

4. Have the sequel finished by the end of the year.

While I think this goal may be a little harder to achieve, I don’t think that it will be impossible if I stick to (and exceed) my daily writing goals. I think it wouldn’t be too out of the realm of reason to think I could at least finish the rough draft. Do you?

5. Write/submit queries for at least one article/month for the year. This is a good way to break in, and possibly a way to make a little extra money.

I haven’t even looked at this one. I still think it is a viable option for me, and I really would like to get the experience and still contribute some to the household income. My goal is to revisit this in July/August and start from there.

6. Go to the ACFW conference.

Sadly, this is not an option for me this year. I thought my husband had this week off, but he doesn’t and he can’t get it off. I will really miss the conference opportunities this year, but look forward to next year when hopefully there will be more options for me.

7. Keep up with my blogs by creating new posts at least three times a week.

This is another area that was rough for the first few months of 2010. However, like the rest of my writing, it has picked up since April. While I don’t always make the three posts a week, I am posting more and more. Part of my problem sometimes is finding something I think would be interesting for you all to read about. Over the last month I’ve come up with some ideas and theme days that I hope will keep the readers (YOU!) coming back for more.

8. Read one writing and one non-writing book/month. (This month the writing book is Fire in Fiction by Donald Maas and the non-writing book is This Present Darkness by Frank Peretti.)

Yeah, if you think I didn’t have time and energy to write, I didn’t have much more for reading either. I still don’t think this is an outrageous goal; I just need to focus more on making time for reading. Right now I’m reading Brandilyn Collins’ Getting Into Character (yes, still…I’m telling you—no time and energy) and John B. Olson’s Shade.

Now, I’ve reflected on my goals, figured out where and why I came up short, and reassessed. I made new goals and new commitments to follow through. It’s your turn! What goals did you make that need some tweeking? Share!

Is Your Goal to be Published?

Over the last couple of months, I’ve been introduced in various ways to several new writers. They all had one thing in common—no idea what they were doing, or what it took to be published. In fact, one woman was complaining to me that she had received several rejections from publishing houses because they didn’t like the way her novel was written, but she didn’t want to change her novel to suit their needs.

Meeting these people took me back many moons ago to when I first decided to take my writing seriously. In July 2006, I had one novel that was about halfway finished. Inspired by a co-worker, I had been working on the novel for about six months, but kind of lost steam after I moved from Kansas to Texas and became a stay-at-home mom. However, with the extra time I had on my hands (in what little spurts the newborn baby slept and I didn’t sleep with her), I decided to finish my novel.

The first thing I did was join a novel workshop group on Writing.Com. The Novel Workshop Group was a large workshop, divided into several genres with their own forums. To have your novel on the board, you had to commit to providing one review of another person’s chapter per week. That was doable for me, so I delved on into the Young Adult workshop.

Boy, was I in for a surprise.

I honestly don’t remember much about my first review, but I will say that the first few that I received were real eye-openers. Apparently there was a lot more to writing a novel than sitting down and pouring your heart out onto a blank page. It seemed there were stuff like rules and guidelines. People expected you to be aware of character arcs, plot development, setting, etc. I didn’t even know half of what they were talking about. So, I swallowed my pride, absorbed each review, and started doing my own research.

I found blogs by writers and agents. I signed up for newsletters. I went to the store (when I could afford to) and bought books on writing and editing. I found out that I had barely scratched the surface of this crazy world we call writing and publishing. I was merely a very small fish in a massive pond.

One of the most important things I learned was that we should always be teachable. We never know it all, especially in the world of publishing where everything is always changing. Reader’s tastes change, which means what the publishers are looking for changes, which means what we are expected to produce changes. Even if those didn’t change, we would still never be perfect. There’s always something to improve upon.

Which brings us back to these new writers and their frustration with not being able to write the way they want. Is it okay for them to ignore the very things we work so hard to learn and channel?

Of course it is.

It becomes an issue of their goal with writing the story. Do they write for themselves? Or do they write to be published? If they write because they just feel that story needs to be told, and the only people who will probably ever see it are friends and family, they can write however they want. And yes, the people that read their story will probably even gush over how wonderful it is. (Yes, generally what your mom says is only about 5% helpful—she’ll love whatever you write.)

But if their goal is to be published—to have a publishing house offer them a book contract with advances and royalties and whatever else—then they have to learn that their way isn’t necessarily the right way. They have to bend to the will of the man! (Or so to speak) This may mean making hard decisions on characters and plot development. It may mean joining an AA group (Adverbs Anonymous), or taking classes on the basics of writing fiction.

So what is your goal? Or what have you learned about the business or about writing that surprised you?

Writing Goals 2010

It's finally here. 2010 was ushered in by cold weather and warm hearts. It is my desire...my passion...to make this the best year ever. I know that I have so much to look forward to, number one being the precious baby that will make his appearnence sometime in June.

This year will also be a great year for my writing...maybe not in big ways, but with big passion! I'm really going to put myself out there this year, get down and dirty, leave no stone unturned...and maybe I'm getting off track here.

So, without further ado, here are my writing goals for 2010:

1. Write 500 words/day except for Sunday/holidays on either manuscript or blogs so that I can get in the habit of writing even without inspiration. I'll keep track of this on a spreadsheet.

2. Finish DS by the end of February so that I can enter it in the Genesis Contest and submit to MLP (and others).

3. Write the first draft of the sequel to DS by the time the baby comes so I am not stressed about getting it on paper and can relax and edit.

4. Have the sequel finished by the end of the year.

5. Write/submit queries for at least one article/month for the year. This is a good way to break in, and possibly a way to make a little extra money.

6. Go to the ACFW conference.

7. Keep up with my blogs by creating new posts at least three times a week.

8. Read one writing and one non-writing book/month. (This month the writing book is Fire in Fiction by Donald Maas and the non-writing book is This Present Darkness by Frank Peretti.)

Yes, I know...ambitious. But, hey, goals are supposed to push us. Right? You should see the list when I add in my non-writing goals. Sheesh...it's going to be a busy year!

Thank you everyone for joining me in 2009 and inspiring me in all your individual ways. I hope you'll stick with me in 2010 as we take it by storm!

5 Ws and H

5Ws and H

I love ushering in the new year. Really, I do. New Year=New Start. I can put all the mistakes and disappointments of the previous year behind me. Several moments are spared to rejoice over successes and to count my many blessings…but then, as with most people, my focus turns to the coming year. What can I do different? What do I want to change about me? About my life? Every year I make several lists of different kinds of resolutions…and every year, about two weeks in, those resolutions fly out the window along with my motivation. Sad, I know.

Ironically, this year one of my resolutions is going to be to keep all my resolutions. Ha ha…we’ll see if that works.

One of the oddest things about letting my resolutions fall through, is I know how to make goals, and I know what I need to do to keep them…I. Just. Don’t. But, as with the other disappointments from last year, I am putting that behind me, and letting my infectious optimism take over.

So, now I look forward to 2010, and consider what I want to accomplish, what I want to change.

In the meantime, let’s consider what a goal/resolution should look like. A goal should be three things: Realistic, Specific, and Measurable. A goal needs to be realistic for your person. While someone may be able to lose 30 pounds in three months, that doesn’t mean you are able to. You know your strengths and weaknesses, and while a goal should push you, it really shouldn’t set you up for failure.

Any goal you make should be able to be measured in some way. If we stick with the 30 pounds in three months, you can break that down by week or month (2.5 lbs/wk, 10 lbs/mo). With a goal like writing 500 words a day, you can keep a spreadsheet where you record your daily word count to keep up with your progress.

And last of all, the more specific your goal, the better idea you have of what you need to do to accomplish it. A good way to achieve this is when writing out your goals, use the 5Ws and H. You remember learning those in elementary school, right?

WHO
WHAT
WHEN
WHERE
WHY
HOW

Who is involved in this goal? Most of the time this is you…but sometimes it could be a family goal or group goal.

What is the goal? Be specific. Lose 30 lbs? Write 500 words a day? Read from your Bible more?

When will this goal be accomplished by? Some goals take less time than others. Like I said earlier, the goal should push you, but not over the edge. Lose that weight in four months? Write so much per day, five days a week? Read every night before bed?

Where will you work on this goal? Now, this one won’t always apply. But, if you’re like me, you work best under certain conditions. I always write better when I’m at my computer desk with a soda and gummy bears. Therefore, I know that I need to set aside time every day to go to that place to get adequate work done.

Why is this goal important? What is your biggest reason for accomplishing this goal? This is important because we discover our passion for this goal. If you don’t care about it, why will it matter? Why will you give it priority?

How will you accomplish this goal? That’s right…an action plan. This is where most people fail at goal setting. We write out our goals, but then we have no clue how we are to go about pursuing them. If we sit down in the beginning and plan it out, we’ll have no excuses later on. Want to lose 30 lbs in four months? How? Are you going to work out three times a week? What kind of workout? Where? Are you going to alternate exercise routines? I’m not saying that the plan has to be complicated, or even thoroughly planned out, but you have to give yourself some sort of jumping off point.

So a goal might look something like this:

I am going to write at least 500 word/day, every day except for Sundays for a grand total of 156,500 words for the year. I am going to set aside at least two hours every night to sit at my computer desk and work on either my novel or blogs, and then record my progress on a spreadsheet I set up on my computer.

So, that’s one of my goals—now you’re turn. What is one of your goals for 2010?