Goals for '10

I was reading a blog by a pro -he has 90 books published- he posted a ten part series on motivation. Part of that had to do with setting writing goals. His idea is
(This is just a short paraphrase of some of what he said about setting goals.)

Find Your Dream. Something big like being on a top best seller list for forty weeks.

Figure a Smaller Five Year Dream.  Something like publishing five books in five years. According to him that is out of your control since an editor has to buy those books, but something to work toward.

Set Your Yearly Goal.  This is in your control completely. Set how many words you want to write and plan on how many per day that you would have to write to make that number. Part of that is planning on not writing every day, since things come up. maybe only three fourths of the number of days in the year.

Set Your Weekly Writing, Mailing, and Learning Goals. This is your focus, every one week or better yet every day. Set up what you want to do every day plan it around family and work etc. And remember that every week is a fresh start. Be realistic but at the same time push yourself. Figure in time for learning the storytelling craft but do not include that in your writing time. he says that if you can do three pages a day or six pages half of the days in a year you can do three novels in one year. That would be a whole lot of short stories. Don't think that much about your big dream and focus on each week.

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I haven't thought out my complete goals yet since I have to decide on what I can realistic do in a day. But I have already completed one goal for '10. I started a writing blog of my own.

Right now my big dream goal is to write a novel that someone can't put down. I am reading two like that right now and I want readers to feel that way about one of mine. An aside here but one of those two is by a writer with only three books out. His writing, never bad, has significantly improved with each novel. I think he's going to be up there with the greats if he keeps going as he is. On top of that he is in a band.

This goal is under my control for I can practice and at the same time do what I can to learn the writing craft thereby working toward that goal. I may have to set aside certain days to just work on novels though. I used to have enough time to work on both novels and short stories but my wife is now working on her online craft business, she has joined an online craft group also. But I can use the time she is online to read writing books,  plus some chores around the house.

That makes it hard to set a certain number of word or pages though.  Bu if I did that it could help me fight procrastination when I don't feel like writing.
I haven't thought out my complete goals yet since I have to decide on what I can realistic do in a day. But I have already completed one goal for '10. I started a writing blog of my own.

Right now my big dream goal is to write a novel that someone can't put down. I am reading two like that right now and I want readers to feel that way about one of mine. An aside here but one of those two is by a writer with only three books out. His writing, never bad, has significantly improved with each novel. I think he's going to be up there with the greats if he keeps going as he is. On top of that he is in a band.

This goal is under my control for I can practice and at the same time do what I can to learn the writing craft thereby working toward that goal. I may have to set aside certain days to just work on novels though. I used to have enough time to work on both novels and short stories but my wife is now working on her online craft business, she has joined an online craft group also. But I can use the time she is online to read writing books,  plus some chores around the house.

That makes it hard to set a certain number of word or pages though.  But if I did that it could help me fight procrastination when I don't feel like writing.                                                              Trying to turn lead into Gold  LD