I've been learning a lot about what it means to be a writer. Some in part to my friends, some to writers online, and a lot to God.
January of 2019 was one of the hardest months I've had. It felt like blow after blow was hitting me. Knocking me back down before I could get all the way back up. With the new year, I changed a lot of my beliefs about new year resolutions, and decided to make new month resolutions.
For January my goal's were: Read who books, write everyday in some way, and post 3 blog posts. I read almost two books, wrote most days, and did post three blog posts. But nonetheless I felt like I failed. I didn't write as much as I wanted to, or on the story I committed to. I those two books I read took me away from homework that continued to pile up and the books were so good it made me feel like my writing was so weak. But I am proud of how well I've been able to post on here.
I set new goals for February. I still wanted to read 2 books, get to 20,000 words, and post at least twice. I only accomplished about half of that. I read half of one book and half of another, I'm 1,000 below 20,000, but I did post twice.
To be honest, I don't know what my March goals were. I took a week off writing because school got to insane and I had a weekend trip where I couldn't write. I'm trying to start reading more and listening to more podcasts and audio dramas. I found one I'm addicted to now "The Bright Sessions". But, thinking long term, I'm not quite sure. January everything in my life was torn apart, and then again in February the blows kept coming all the way up until the first of March.
I'm still young, and the older I get and the more experiences I endure, the wider my understanding of the world becomes. But when life keeps knocking you down it's hard to get back up and keep going.
I have a chronic illness, meaning a disease that will never go away, there is no cure. And lately that has been particularly hard to manage. It has me down, but also thinking about how I've never read a book with a character who has my condition. I even went and looked up if there were any, and all were outside my genre of choice or looked to be majorly cliche. That makes me want to write a book with a MC or side char that is like me. Because I want to see my disease represented in fiction just as much as people with mental illnesses, and other chronic illnesses do.
So while I have been making monthly goals, I'm starting to make a list of writer goals for myself. While I feel uncomfortable representing different races, ethnicity's and gender orientations (the later because of my religion) I want to write characters who are not just a normal high school students with a fantasy twist to the plot, or a hot werewolf romance, I'd rather write characters with depression, anxiety, Type 1 Diabetes, Lupus, or cold urticaria (my sister has this.). These people should get to read stories where they are the ones going on adventures and saving the world also.
I also have a growing list of things I will not do as a writer. Some are because they are unfair comparisons, or because I find it distasteful.
1. Don't compare any relationship I write to Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase.
2. Don't think of the beautiful ending (and writing in general) of the Legend series by Marie Lu
3. Don't even think about Narnia while writing because it is to beautiful.
4. Recognize and accept that some writers have more beautiful description than you ever will, and that's okay. Not everyone can write as beautifully as Leigh Bardugo or Dan Wells, but don't stop trying.
5. Remember that no book you read and love is a first draft, thus you cannot compare your own writing to it.
6. Write romance well or don't write it at all.
Each month I have re written my goals and altered them to make sense for the month, or to continue to push myself. Here they are.
The first month I wasn't sure where this was going, and I erased each blog post on my list as I published them. I didn't write everyday, but more consistently than before, and I completed every other goal on there. So I decided to do it for February also.
February was a little more organized, and I decided to add a quote that would motivate me through the month.
In March I ended up failing my goals. I didn't finish reading either of those books, though I did read Talk like TED by Carmine Gallo (AMAZING) and a novella. By the end of the month I still needed 2,000 words to make it to 30,000 (10,000 below my goal). But my quote of the month inspired me to keep going no matter how far behind I felt like I was getting.
To recover from failing all those goals, I decided to cut back. Post twice on my blog (this is number 1!) and three times on Instagram (I just posted #1 before this post). I left my other goal area blank for now, but I have some in mind. I still want to continue my yearly book goal of at least 2 a month (Almost done with Real Artists Don't Starve by Jeff Goins). I haven't found a quote for the month, but I like this one a lot, and so maybe I'll keep it for the month.
My goal for this year, which took me a while to realize, wasn't just "Finish draft one of a book", but 'Start calling myself a writer". And in one of my classes the professor had us tell her what career we were aiming for, and before I even thought about it I told her" I'm a writer, and I'd like to publish books." And If nothing else this year, I just want to keep writing, and get better at telling people I'm a writer.
What goals do you guys set for your writing or reading? Let's talk about it!
Much love,
Thane