Honey Bear and I set some personal and family goals last night, and it got me thinking about my writing goals, both for this year and for last year. Here are the highlights.
Writing goal for 2010: Write at least five hours a week.
Pretty easy, right? I set this goal for several reasons. First, I didn’t want to put an artificial deadline on Bob, because artificial deadlines sometimes produce artificial results. Also, since I had a six-month-old baby in the house, I felt like I wasn’t writing as much as I wanted to--or needed to--to be able to finish Bob in a reasonable amount of time. At the same time, I knew I wouldn’t be able to devote serious energy to my writing until Lady settled into a better sleep routine.
I’m happy to report that, within a few months of setting that goal, I was easily smashing it. Lady grew up a little, so she started taking regular naps and going down for bed at a predictable time each night. And since Honey Bear was still doing the whole graduate school thing (in addition to holding down a full-time job), I had plenty of time to write while he was doing homework.
Writing goal #1 for 2011: Finish Bob’s revision by the first week in February.
You’ll notice that this first goal is an artificial deadline:) Happily, it’s an artificial deadline that’s neither too close nor too far-out. I may even finish ahead of schedule. More details in the weeks to come.
Writing goal #2 for 2011: Complete another manuscript by the end of the year.
Oh, look, another artificial deadline, and a trickier one at that. I still have a few ideas floating around somewhere in my head, but I haven’t committed serious brainpower to them yet, since I’ve been working on Bob’s revision. Still, I think this goal will be an attainable challenge. I’ve learned a little about pacing myself this past year, and I’m a much better self-editor now than I was a year ago (which means I can usually spot the problem areas in a manuscript more quickly). I’m excited to see where this goal takes me and how it turns out.
Okay, your turn. What goals, writing or otherwise, have you set for yourself this year, and how did last year’s goals turn out?
Showing posts with label deadlines. Show all posts
Showing posts with label deadlines. Show all posts
Monday, January 3, 2011
Friday, January 1, 2010
New Year's Evolution
With the start of a new year, I, like everybody else, have been thinking about goals. I don't like calling them resolutions, because resolutions seem so short-term and easy to ignore. So I'm calling them goals, because I am going to achieve them.
Now I obviously have goals in other areas of my life, but I'm sure you're only interested in my writing ones. And my writing goals are the most interesting, anyway, since I realized not long ago that I've been doing them all wrong.
In the past, my writing goal has always been to publish a book. It's not so bad as far as an ambition goes, I guess, but it's a pretty lousy goal, mostly because I have little control over whether I attain it. So this year I've been trying to come up with something completely within my power to achieve. But that, as it turns out, hasn't been so easy, either.
You've probably heard of Stephen Covey's SMART goals, which are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, time-based goals. I'm not a huge fan of the acronym, since it's a little too cutesy for my tastes--and since achievable and realistic mean essentially the same thing--but I appreciate the sentiment. So with those ideas in mind, here's how my writing goal for the year evolved.
My biggest problem, obviously, had to do with achievability: I was trying to attain something that I didn't completely control. So I decided to set a goal this year that focused solely on the writing. My first thought was to make Bob perfect--that is, ready to query--by the end of the year, but I didn't like that idea, either, because as much as I agree that goals should be time-based, I already knew I didn't want to set an arbitrary deadline. I've done that in the past and discovered that my writing only suffers for it. I'm not the sort of person who needs outside motivation to get her work done, so I became more concerned with hitting the deadline than working toward what the deadline was supposed to be helping me achieve: slow, consistent effort that would (eventually) result in a finished, perfect manuscript. So deadlines were out.
But what about that idea of slow, consistent effort? My next thought was to set a weekly number of hours I wanted to spend writing, but I was worried that I'd have a hard time deciding what that number should be. My weeks can be so erratic (and for anyone with a two-year-old or six-month-old, I'm sure you know exactly what I mean), and I didn't want to set myself up for failure. When I voiced this concern to my husband, he suggested that I start with something low, some number that I'm already pretty certain I can do, and then increase it bit by bit until I'm stretching to reach my goal--but still mostly reaching it.
This seemed like a great idea. (Aren't spouses wonderful things?) So here it is, my writing goal for 2010: I will write for at least five hours every week, roughly one hour every weekday, no matter how, no matter what.
Now I know what you're thinking: Five hours every week? That's it? And two years ago, when my two-year-old was six months old and sleeping like a sloth, I would have thought the same thing. But I'm starting low and testing it, and then I'll have to see where it goes. It'll be a grand adventure. And somewhere along the way, I'm hoping to declare Bob complete.
So what are your writing goals for the new year, and how do you plan to achieve them? And if you have any advice for me, I'd love to hear it.
Now I obviously have goals in other areas of my life, but I'm sure you're only interested in my writing ones. And my writing goals are the most interesting, anyway, since I realized not long ago that I've been doing them all wrong.
In the past, my writing goal has always been to publish a book. It's not so bad as far as an ambition goes, I guess, but it's a pretty lousy goal, mostly because I have little control over whether I attain it. So this year I've been trying to come up with something completely within my power to achieve. But that, as it turns out, hasn't been so easy, either.
You've probably heard of Stephen Covey's SMART goals, which are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, time-based goals. I'm not a huge fan of the acronym, since it's a little too cutesy for my tastes--and since achievable and realistic mean essentially the same thing--but I appreciate the sentiment. So with those ideas in mind, here's how my writing goal for the year evolved.
My biggest problem, obviously, had to do with achievability: I was trying to attain something that I didn't completely control. So I decided to set a goal this year that focused solely on the writing. My first thought was to make Bob perfect--that is, ready to query--by the end of the year, but I didn't like that idea, either, because as much as I agree that goals should be time-based, I already knew I didn't want to set an arbitrary deadline. I've done that in the past and discovered that my writing only suffers for it. I'm not the sort of person who needs outside motivation to get her work done, so I became more concerned with hitting the deadline than working toward what the deadline was supposed to be helping me achieve: slow, consistent effort that would (eventually) result in a finished, perfect manuscript. So deadlines were out.
But what about that idea of slow, consistent effort? My next thought was to set a weekly number of hours I wanted to spend writing, but I was worried that I'd have a hard time deciding what that number should be. My weeks can be so erratic (and for anyone with a two-year-old or six-month-old, I'm sure you know exactly what I mean), and I didn't want to set myself up for failure. When I voiced this concern to my husband, he suggested that I start with something low, some number that I'm already pretty certain I can do, and then increase it bit by bit until I'm stretching to reach my goal--but still mostly reaching it.
This seemed like a great idea. (Aren't spouses wonderful things?) So here it is, my writing goal for 2010: I will write for at least five hours every week, roughly one hour every weekday, no matter how, no matter what.
Now I know what you're thinking: Five hours every week? That's it? And two years ago, when my two-year-old was six months old and sleeping like a sloth, I would have thought the same thing. But I'm starting low and testing it, and then I'll have to see where it goes. It'll be a grand adventure. And somewhere along the way, I'm hoping to declare Bob complete.
So what are your writing goals for the new year, and how do you plan to achieve them? And if you have any advice for me, I'd love to hear it.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
NaNo My WriMo
Ah, November. November is a month of goods and bads for me. On the one hand, Thanksgiving--and especially Thanksgiving dinner--is fantastic, but on the other, the air is now cold enough that it can no longer reasonably be called brisk. Fortunately, that means sock season is upon us, but it also means the college football season is kicking its last. And somewhere in the middle of all this is NaNoWriMo.
NaNoWriMo (or National Novel Writing Month, for the uninitiated) is, apparently, the month set aside for writing novels. The idea is simple: Start and finish an entire novel sometime between November first and November thirtieth. But the actual doing, of course, is much more complicated.
Consider, for example, a 60,000-word novel, which is actually on the shorter side. To complete said novel within the allotted timeframe, you’d have to compose an average of 2,000 words a day, or roughly eight typed, double-spaced pages. If you’d like to take a day off every week, you’re looking at averaging just over 2,300 words a day, or about nine and a quarter typed, double-spaced pages. And if you only plan to write on weekdays, you’re up to a little more than 2,700 words a day, or nearly eleven of those typed, double-spaced pages. And they’re probably not going to be terribly polished pages, either. Heck, I don’t even know if I’d have the time to put 2,000 stream-of-consciousness words down on paper every day, let alone anything that was actually readable by someone who wasn’t living inside my head.
But I think the thing about NaNoWriMo that really gets to me is the whole, I don’t know, randomness of it all. It’s like Valentine’s Day: If you don’t have a special someone, you probably don’t even notice the day’s any different (or you notice too much and work yourself up into a hand-wringing dither that only chocolate will fix). And if you do have a significant other, do you really need a special day to show that special someone you love him/her? I mean, don’t you show him/her that sort of stuff every day?
So it is with writing. Either you don’t write most of the time and you don’t plan to this month (or you decide to try and don’t last the first week). Or you do write, all the time, and then November comes along and you…what? Write all the time? Weren’t you already doing that? Except now your writing is probably far below its usual standard, since you’re struggling to churn out those 2,000 words.
I’m sure this method works for some people, and that’s great. Maybe it’s a wonderful way to produce a first draft and I just haven’t caught the vision yet. As it is, I think I’ll just hunker down and hold out for Turkey Day--and go buy myself a new pair of fuzzy socks.
NaNoWriMo (or National Novel Writing Month, for the uninitiated) is, apparently, the month set aside for writing novels. The idea is simple: Start and finish an entire novel sometime between November first and November thirtieth. But the actual doing, of course, is much more complicated.
Consider, for example, a 60,000-word novel, which is actually on the shorter side. To complete said novel within the allotted timeframe, you’d have to compose an average of 2,000 words a day, or roughly eight typed, double-spaced pages. If you’d like to take a day off every week, you’re looking at averaging just over 2,300 words a day, or about nine and a quarter typed, double-spaced pages. And if you only plan to write on weekdays, you’re up to a little more than 2,700 words a day, or nearly eleven of those typed, double-spaced pages. And they’re probably not going to be terribly polished pages, either. Heck, I don’t even know if I’d have the time to put 2,000 stream-of-consciousness words down on paper every day, let alone anything that was actually readable by someone who wasn’t living inside my head.
But I think the thing about NaNoWriMo that really gets to me is the whole, I don’t know, randomness of it all. It’s like Valentine’s Day: If you don’t have a special someone, you probably don’t even notice the day’s any different (or you notice too much and work yourself up into a hand-wringing dither that only chocolate will fix). And if you do have a significant other, do you really need a special day to show that special someone you love him/her? I mean, don’t you show him/her that sort of stuff every day?
So it is with writing. Either you don’t write most of the time and you don’t plan to this month (or you decide to try and don’t last the first week). Or you do write, all the time, and then November comes along and you…what? Write all the time? Weren’t you already doing that? Except now your writing is probably far below its usual standard, since you’re struggling to churn out those 2,000 words.
I’m sure this method works for some people, and that’s great. Maybe it’s a wonderful way to produce a first draft and I just haven’t caught the vision yet. As it is, I think I’ll just hunker down and hold out for Turkey Day--and go buy myself a new pair of fuzzy socks.
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