New Year, Same Old Problems

Writing is hard, yo. Getting your story, your characters, your ideas from that mushy, over-caffeinated (and potentially alcohol-muddled) grey lobster meat you call a brain is a task daunting enough that Hercules himself would likely throw up his hands and wander off in search of something a little less difficult. You know, like lopping off all the heads of the Hydra, or taming Hades’ little three-headed puppy.

The worst part is, once you’ve triumphantly slayed your story, and gotten it all down into well-disciplined rows of Times New Roman soldiers, well, that’s when the real hard part begins. Writing is easy, compared to getting your shiny new work of middle grade genius published and out into the world for thousands of appreciative readers. There’s that querying of agents step and praying the query letter you spent three weeks writing-hating-and-rewriting catches the perfect person’s eye. Then, even after that works out, there’s a seemingly endless string of hours, days, weeks, months, years, millennia spent wait for your agent’s matchmaking magic to turn up the one editor who both loves your manuscript like a fuzzy brand new kitten and has just the right hole in the following year’s publication schedule to slide it into.

All that together? Well, it’s enough to make any normal, well-adjusted person want to bite through a cast iron frying pan in a fit of HULK SMASH-ness. And let’s be honest, how many writers start out normal and well-adjusted, anyway?
We all have moments, well, days, more like, when no matter where we find ourselves along the patience-wrenching path to publication, we’re ready to both throw up and throw up our hands, and call that truck driving school that advertises in the middle of the day during Judge Toby.

Luckily, I’ve got the answer to surviving the Long Painful Road.

But you’re not going to like it.

I didn’t either, when it occurred to me.

The solution to preventing that transition to driving freight cross-country? It’s stupidly simple. You kinda know it already.

Go back to the reason you started this nonsense for in the first place. In the beginning, when we have no words, no shiny manuscript, no hopes or dreams of bestseller lists, most of us have little more than an idea. A thought. A character. Maybe a scene playing out in your head. Whatever it was, it was just a tiny spark of story, and you fed it and nurtured it and worked it until it was a roaring blaze of something real, something you could feed all your adult wants and wishes into. But whether or not that story can or will fulfill any of those dreams and wishes is now largely beyond your control*.

Because you’re the fire maker. You take the spark and you build it. That’s your only role in this chain of events. It’s the only part you can manage yourself. The only part you truly control. All the rest depends on forces beyond you. Might as well lament the weather or the rising of the sun as bemoan the pace and complications of trying to get published.

So, here at the start of a new year, it’s the perfect time to think back to why we got started with this writing business in the first place. Time to stop shaking our collective fists at the sky in pointless frustration while the fire behind us grows cold. It’s time to get back to feeding that fire, to doing what we came here for.

It’s time to write more and complain less.

Because with writing, like everything else in life, the easiest way to solve a problem is to recognize that it was never your problem to fix in the first place. But if you focus on the fire, the words, eventually those other problems will sort themselves out without you.

Pud’n

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*Not including self-publishing, of course. But that's a horse of a different color, and an entirely different post.

Keeping to your goals!

Happy 2015!

Maybe it’s a cliché, but this time every year we all do it. We make goals.

I will… eat better in 2015. I will…. Exercise more in 2015. I will… write more, spend more time with my kids, watch less TV, catch up on my reading lists, go back to school, get a new job, get a promotion, get published!...

Some goals stick for a week. Some a month. Some we never even touch with a ten foot pole. But how many of us actually achieve our New Year’s resolutions? According to statistics… not many. 

So how do you make 2015 the best it can be? Here are a few tips.

1) Make the right goals.

               Jamie talked a bit about this earlier this week. Some goals are completely out of our control so it’s unfair to hold ourselves to them. I’ve done this many times, made goals that I couldn’t control. Truth is, those are usually the big life goals that really matter, so I’d never tell you to drop them. It’s okay to have those goals, just so long as you understand that it’s not your fault if you don’t achieve them. So here’s what you do.

               Keep those goals… but break them up. Instead of saying “My goal for 2015 is to get an agent,” say “I will send out 100 queries this year.” Or “I will start to query my new WIP this year” (maybe with a specific time, like by summer?). Think about what things you can do to give yourself the best chance at achieving that overall goal so that you know you did the best you could.

2) Be Flexible                  

                                                                             

               Sometimes things change. What you imagine is going to be SO AWESOME… isn’t working out. Are you a failure if you stop querying that book after 2 months because you realize it’s not ready to be published? NO! Are you a failure if you stop trying to run a mile a day because you realize it’s hurting your knees? NO!

               When you realize something isn’t going to work out: STOP. And try something new. Your knees are hurting? Find a gym with a pool and start swimming instead. When you realize your novel isn’t going to work out? STOP and either find a way to fix it, or start something new. It makes no sense to be stubborn and keep pushing against those brick walls. Find a way around them.

3) Find someone to be accountable with!

               According to this website http://www.statisticbrain.com/new-years-resolution-statistics/ you are ten times more likely to achieve your goals if they are explicit. A.K.A. you tell other people about them.

               Post them on your blog, post them on Facebook and twitter, tell your family and friends… even if they couldn’t care less. I know when I have something I need to do, I tell my husband. Most of the time, he doesn’t care. “Oh you’re going to clean out that closet tomorrow? That’s cool. You’re going to finish your draft this week? Awesome.” Sometimes I get a text back that says… “Umm, okay?” I laugh and say, I’m telling you so that I’ll actually DO IT. It works guys. Sometimes, he asks if I did it. Sometimes he doesn’t. On occasion it doesn’t work out, but I am so much more likely to commit to my goal just by knowing I’ve said it out loud and someone heard me. The absolute best way to do this is find someone willing to check in with you. Someone who will notice if you don’t update them, or if you’re not moving forward. I recommend hooking up with a CP for this. Help each other stay accountable, and help each other brain storm if one of those goals aren’t working out.

The goal of a goal is to TRY something new. Try to make yourself better. Try to move forward. It’s okay if you don’t succeed so long as you fought for it, so long as you didn’t give up. 

Even if your goals change throughout the year, if you keep working, you succeeded in my book.

Are these things you’ve ever tried? Did they work for you? What are your goals this year?