The Year Behind and the Year Ahead

What’s behind me is not important!



Just kidding. I think what’s behind me does matter, which is why I like to review the year behind before setting goals for the year ahead.

Because this is the start of a new decade (yes, I know technically a decade is any ten year period, but you know what I mean) I thought it would be kind of cool to see what I was up to ten years ago, and I gotta tell you, I feel like I’ve kind of been back sliding.

For one thing, ten years ago I had three blogs going (two of which are now defunct) and I was posting to them several times a week, including serializing a couple of my novels. 2010 was also the year I switched novels 10,000 words and one week into NaNo and still managed to rock it.

While I think I’ve grown a lot as a writer, I think I was getting more actual writing done when I was working outside the home. It added structure to my day. There is a fitting quote out there (which of course I can’t find) about how it’s easier to add just one more thing to your work load when you have a million things to do than to find the motivation to get up in the morning when you have nothing to do. I think it kind of applies to my situation and I think it’s something I need to work on in the year ahead.

But enough of that. Let’s review the goals I set in 2019 and how I did with them.

Publishing:
1. Get Wandering Wizards finished and published - Fail
2. Do an anthology of short stories - Pass
3. Start sending out stories and poems to appropriate markets - Fail

Organizing and Indexing:
1. Set up a searchable database for my poetry; have only one hard copy and one electronic copy - Fail
2. Organize short fiction – keep only one copy and delete extras - made a start
3. Organize photos and delete doubles - Fail

Writing:
1. Write a minimum of 30 minutes a day - Hahahaha Fail
2. Finish Wandering Wizards - Fail
3. Finish Shattered - Fail
4. Make a start on An Elemental Spirit - Pass

Lifestyle:
1. More reading, less mindless surfing/socializing/gaming - getting better
2. Spend time doing things away from the computer - Fail
3. Get back on the exercise band wagon - off and on

Well, it appears I didn’t do so hot on my goals last year. I got my anthology done, although it wasn’t what I had in mind, but I definitely didn’t send any stories out for publication.

I did make a start on trying to organize my story files, but only my story files and I really didn’t get that far with it. I have this fear of deletion which is why I still have a lot of hard copies as well as e-copies.

The writing thing was kind of feast or famine. I did get some work done on Wandering Wizards, but it’s not finished yet. Never gave Shattered a passing thought, but I did get a draft done of An Elemental Spirit.

It looks like 2019 wasn’t a stellar year. One can only hope that 2020 will be better.

As for my goals for the year ahead, I still haven’t come up with any yet, but I’ll post them as soon as I do.

Happy New Year!

In case you haven’t figured it out, the holidays kind of got away from me this year. Normally this is where I’d do a recap on last year’s goals and share the goals for the year ahead, but I haven’t even given them a thought. This has become the holiday that never ends and I haven’t had time for anything except that.

Having the holidays smack in the middle of the week threw me right off and I feel like I spent a lot of my time scrambling to catch up. Of course I think a lot of that could have been poor planning on my part. I just couldn’t seem to get my head in the game.

The Christmas spirit seemed to be missing this year, at least as far as I was concerned. I got the tree up and decorated, the shopping was actually done ahead of time, although the cookies didn’t get baked until Christmas Eve, but I’m not even sure snow could have made a difference (we’re on day 12 of an above freezing but grey and dismal streak).

I guess part of it was everything was rush, rush, rush this year. I never seemed to be able to relax. There was always something to cook or clean or organize, but I have to admit a lot of it was pressure I was putting on myself.

If I’m honest, what really put me behind was the anthology – again, pressure I was putting on myself. I should have just let it go for another year, but I was like a dog with a bone.

I have holiday obligations right through the weekend, but I promise on Sunday I’ll do a combo post of the old year in review and the goals for the year ahead.

Happy New Year