Into the New Year

 We are very close to the New Year. Here are some of the things that will help us, as writers, get off to a good start:

• Set goals for 2023 for both writing and for reading. When we read, we relax, but we also gather new ideas for what we might want to include in our own work.
• Be okay if your writing does not read well (to you). Once the words are down on paper, they can be revised.
• Block out time for both writing and revising. One of my favorite webinars from 2022 was one that Laurie King presented on Facebook about revising our work.
• This is a perennial problem for me - using social media and promoting my own work.
• Take classes - whatever classes appeal to you. There are many that are offered as digital classes on the Internet.

Here are some of the places where I look for classes on writing and writing-related content:

• Master Class
  
• Infostack
  
• Jane Friedman
  
• Gotham Writers
  

Wishing you all a stellar writing year in 2023!

(c) December 2022 Bonnie Cehovet

Reproduction is prohibited without the written consent of the author.

Writing Goals For The New Year

I find it much more productive to set writing goals at the beginning of the year (that are reviewed quarterly), rather than setting resolutions that fade away fast. I am in a very good place with that this year, as I am using an At-A-Glance daily planner, and each day has places to write down the first and last things done each day, the top three things to do each day, what needs to be done "right now", and what the "win" of the day was. This soothes my Cappie soul! 

When  I sit down to write our my yearly writing goals, the first thing I do is to try and make them realistic! I am still working full time, so I have to fit my writing around that. Any deadlines that I set out have to be functional. I break my goals down into smaller, achievable bites. I mean, what are the chances that I can sit down and develop character profiles for my entire book in one day? Or that I can edit my entire book in three days?

Develop some way of keeping track of where you are on your book. For me, the easiest way is by word count. I really don't care how many hours a day I write - just so that I am writing every day. I also don't care what time of day I write - I have the benefit of being able to write whenever I want to, day or night. My most productive time is usually in the oh dark thirty hours!

I push myself to define goals for each step of a writing project. The project itself must become just as important as the characters themselves. 

Stay positive, and strive to keep a work/life balance. Use insirational quotes to your advantage.

Some people may want to share their goals with a writing partner, with each partner holding the other partner accountable for achieving their goals (or understanding why they are not achieving their goals). This is not something that I would ever do, but many people find that it works for them.

Make sure that your goals are specific (or you will be wandering around in a writer's abyss forever!), that you have some way of quantifying/measuring them, and that you have a way of acting on them.

Happy writing for 2019!

(c) January 2019 Bonnie Cehovet

Reproduction prohibited without written permission. 

Setting Writing Goals

We can set goals for ourselves, and then we can set GOALS for ourselves. By this, I mean setting goals that are effective is what we want to focus on. Randomly setting goals is going to give us ... random results! What kind of a house of cards would we be building our stories on if we did that! Realistic goals are three things: measurable, meaningful, and attainable.

As writers, we are our own bosses. We set the pace, we define the story. In setting a measurable goal for our writing, we want to be able to see tangible results. An easy way to do this is to focus on finishing a number of pages per session/day/week, to have a certain amount of chapters done within a certain amount of time, or to edit a certain amount of pages within a certain amount of time. Or, we could focus on sending out a certain number of queries, or posting on social media sites on a predetermined schedule. We need something that shows us that we are making headway.

Attainable goals are literally that - goals that we can reasonably attain. We don't want to set the bar too low, but we also don't want to set the bar so high that it is overwhelming. Take a major goal, and break it down into smaller goals. The feeling of having accomplished a goal, no matter how small, is tremendous! It gives us the needed spark to keep on going.In making sure that our goals are attainable, we need to look at the big picture - what skills do we have, what skills do we need, what else are we going to be doing within the same time period? A little realism doesn't hurt!

To be meaningful, our goals have to take us int he direction we want to go. I have been sidetracked myself by goals that seemed meaningful, but, in hindsight, had nothing to do with where I was at the time, or where I was going. I call that shooting myself in the foot! I have learned a few lessons this way! Recognize that you may have goals in more than one area - you may want to earn a living from your writing, while at the same time you have to pay the mortgage! Make time for the less immediate goal (making a living from your writing, in this case), while still devoting time to your major goal (in this case, paying the mortgage).

Be sure to set both short term goals and long term goals. Make sure that your short term goals support your long term goals, so t hat your house of cards doesn't go boom! Review your goals periodically, to see where you are, and where you are going.

Happy writing!

(c) August 2012 Bonnie Cehovet