What can happen in a year. Part one: Setting goals

I think the best thing a writer can do is to set up a list of goals. I know a list of goals seems like it would be enough, but it isn't. To add to the list of goals, I think a writer needs to set up a timeline complete with dead lines. For instance, my list of goals was: 10 publications, one new novel manuscript and a new group of short stories. What this meant for me, simply, two manuscript length pieces and any number of publications. But if I just said that that was what I wanted to do and gave it no time limit, I may be working on it for the rest of my life. I set these goals to be accomplished in 2017, from January to December.

These are very reasonable goals. I mean, getting ten publications in a year, as a writer of short fiction, can seem like a daunting task. All it really requires is the nerve and perseverance to submit work. To get 10 publications, I had to submit about a one hundred and twenty times. I knew I would just have to do it, all I had to do was set aside the time to do it and thicken my skin for the rejection letters. And ultimately, submitting short stories to magazines takes considerably less time than writing the short stories to begin with.

When it came to the new material, I just wanted to write about 100,000 words. If taken daily this is not a big task either. If I wrote all 365 days in a year, I would only have to write 273 words a day, that's about a page and a half. A page and half a day is no big deal. However, life doesn't work like that. I think two manuscripts in a year is an attainable goal, but it is a serious one.

By the time the fall settled in, in the last few weeks, I have realized how much I've been able to get done as well as the amount I haven't gotten done. So here I am. I am now 9 months down with the year and still have so much to do. I will say this, I got my publications out of the way very early on in the year. I have completed one manuscript. And as far as the generation of a group of short stories, I am about two third the way through.

Fortunately for me, I still have three months to complete these tasks.

Set goals. Set goals. Set goals. If you are a writer, or any sort of artist, create goals. If your art is important to you, you will make it happen, you will find the creativity and you will find the time. It starts with the desire and then it must be followed up with the work. Your work will be more focused if you have goals.

Next time: Working, enjoying milestones and making an endgame.