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Setting Goals by Christopher Patterson

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We all feel like we are floundering at some point in our lives, and in many aspects of our lives. I think as writers, we experience this even more. We have those all too common questions: What am I doing? Am I wasting my time? Where am I going? What should I write? Have people wasted their time on me? And the list goes on and on.

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As a teacher and coach, I am constantly talking to both athletes and students about goal setting. It is an essential practice for anyone wishing to achieve anything. Rarely do we see people who achieve some sort of success without establishing well thought out goals. And yet, I never talk about it to myself in regards to my writing. I set goals as a teacher. I set goals as a coach. I even set personal goals in regards to my faith and my fitness. But up until recently, I haven’t set any goals for my writing. I mean, I have had goals in mind, end dates, release dates, finish dates, etc. But I have never actually put something down on paper. What the heck? Why?

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I think we as writers think, firstly, that goal setting stifles our creativity. I couldn’t begin to tell you, as I did some research for that blog post, how many writers out there refused to plan out their stories. And for that very reason…it stifles their creativity. Don’t put constraints on yourself. Be a free spirit. Be a thinker. I think it couldn’t be farther from the truth.

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Secondly, most of us writers aren’t full time writers. That may be the goal (see, there it is) but that’s not the current reality. The time we give to writing is extra, carved out of a rather busy day that is consumed by full time jobs, kids, spouses, and other commitments. I think there is a fear that we won’t live up to our expectations, i.e. we will fail the goals that we have set.

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One of my coaches, and now very good friend, said something to me once that was very profound, and yet, very simple. He was talking to us about goals and he told us that he couldn’t guarantee success. As an athlete, that’s not necessarily what you want to hear. You want to hear that, if you put in the time and effort, you will achieve success. But he was brutally honest with us. However, he added that if we do everything we need to do, everything required of us, we at least have a shot. A glimmer of hope. A light at the end of the tunnel. If we don’t do all those things—the prepping, the hard work, the running, the lifting, etc.—the one thing he could guarantee us was failure. Before we finished that talk, he made sure to add that the one thing most people fail at—they do all the physical and even mental prep—is writing down our goals. Wow! By not establishing and writing down my goals, I am hurting my potential for performance. And as a coach, I can tell you, its true. This is the one critical piece of the puzzle that many athletes over look and forget. Why are writers any different? We’re not.

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I talk to my students and athletes about SMART goals. You may have heard of them before. I think they are a great way to establish goals, so lets talk about SMART goals in regards to writing and art.

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These are individual aspects of a goal that, when put together, make a goal more achievable. Let’s talk about each individual part.

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³§â€ÖÀ±è±ð³¦¾±´Ú¾±³¦â€”Your goals need to be specific. State specifically what your goal is, when you will achieve it, how you will achieve it, etc. Its not good enough to say, “I want to write a book someday.â€� It’s not even good enough to say, “I would like to be done with my book by the end of the year.â€� First thing you need to do is use definitive language in writing your goals.

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“I am a published author on January 1st, 2020.� Speak about it as if it has already happened.

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“I am the author of XYZ: Book two of the XYZ Chronicles on {insert date}.�

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When we aren’t definitive in our language and if we don’t establish specifics, it gives us an out when we don’t meet that goal. We can throw our hands up and say it wasn’t in the cards. Rather, when we establish the exact goal we want to achieve, with an exact date, with an exact process, with whom we will achieve this goals, and any other specific you can think of, if we don’t meet that goal, we can go back to the drawing board and really figure out why we didn’t achieve our goal.

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²Ñâ€Äâ±ð²¹²õ³Ü°ù²¹²ú±ô±ð—Your goals need to be measurable. How exactly will I know that I have reached my goal? This is certainly related to Specific, in that I need to have an exact date with an exact publication, but how will you feel, who will you be with, what will you do. Are their checkpoints that will help you measure your road to achieving your goal. You will reach 10% of your book by this date, or chapter 10 by this date. You will find an editor by this date, or you will raise enough money for a cover by this time. Understanding what each step will look like, feel like, etc. makes the process so much easier to believe in and understand.

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´¡â€”A³Ù³Ù²¹¾±²Ô²¹²ú±ô±ð—Your goal needs to be attainable. They need to be realistic. If you have never written even a short story, and your goal is to finish a polished novel by the end of next month, that’s not realistic or attainable. If you have one published book that has done okay in terms of sales, and your goal is to go full time by the end of this month, that’s not realistic. Do you have the money, the time, the skills to achieve this goal. And if you don’t, how do you plan on making them and developing them.

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I often refer to this step as the mini-goal step. This is the step in the goal setting process where a person needs to establish mini-goals that will help them achieve the greater goal. How many words a day do you plan on writing? How much money will you set aside a month to pay for editing and cover art? How many emails and newsletters will you send out for marketing? How many contacts will you make?

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This step in our goal setting process might be the most important, simply because it hold your feet to the fire. You have to do a daily, weekly, monthly check to make sure you are track. You have to truly be real with yourself in regards to your goals. I am definitely not a dream killer. There are enough of those out there and if you are an aspiring writer, I am sure you have come across more than one person who has literally laughed at your dream of being an author, writer, producer, or poet. So, I am not saying you can’t chase your dreams. What I am saying is you must be realistic about your dreams. If you don’t have a lot of experience in writing, but you want to be an author, you may need to take some classes, invest time in your craft, and reach out to people. If you are terrible at marketing, you need to spend time honing that craft. If you don’t have any money, maybe you need to get another job to pay for all the things that make a good book good. Let me give you an example of what the attainable portion of goal setting might look like.

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·ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I will write 1000 words a day.

·ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Publishing will cost me $1000, so I will set aside $100 a month for publishing costs.

·ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I will spend 30 minutes a day searching for a reputable editor.

·ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I will spend 30 minutes a day looking for a cover artist.

·ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý I will spend 30 minutes a day reading a book from the genre I write.

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These are just examples of those mini-goals you might write to achieve the overall, big picture goal. And make sure they’re realistic. If you have four kids, work 50 hours a week, and do family night every Wednesday and church every Friday, maybe 1000 words a day is too much. Dial it back to 500. If you barely make ends meet, maybe $100 a month is too much to set aside. Do $25. And then if you find that you have become better at managing your time and money, adjust from there.

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¸é‸é±ð±ô±ð±¹²¹²Ô³Ù—This aspect of goal setting is always an interesting one because it forces people into a gut check moment. Is your goal relevant for you? Wait…what? Let me give you an example. I have had wrestlers who have told me, told their teammates, and written down that their goal was to be a state champion, but then when we actually sit down and talk, I find out that that isn’t their goal at all. Their goal is to get into shape for football, lose some weight, get stronger, etc. You see, their goal wasn’t relevant to their real, well, goals.

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When it comes to writing, why are you writing? It’s perfectly okay to write a story that only you ever intend on reading, or you only ever intend for parents and family and friends to read. Don’t worry about the expectations of other people, worry about what you want to do with your writing. Don’t let people pressure you into spending time and money on editing and publishing if that is truly not what you want to do.

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If you don’t know how to write, you can learn. If you don’t have money, you can raise it or work extra. If you don’t have resources, you can find them. If you don’t have contacts, you can build them. But if you don’t have the desire…well, you will never produce your best product if you don’t have the desire. Go after your goals. Not your parents� goals for you. Not your teachers� goals for you, or your friends�. Go after your goals and be okay with what they are.

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T—Time Bound—This may be the most infuriating and frustrating of all the aspects of goal setting. Create deadlines. Its that simple. And if you don’t meet those deadlines, readjust and revisit why. But one of the worst things we do when we set goals is we set these arbitrary, wishy washy deadlines that aren’t specific. Set a deadline, stick to it, and if you don’t meet your deadline, figure out why, and set a new one.

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Before I move on, let me say that it isn’t okay to miss deadlines. I mean, it is, but it isn’t. Don’t be okay with missing deadlines. Again, too many people will set a deadline, not hit it, and then just shrug their shoulders and give an “oh well.� Make sure you really know why you didn’t meet your deadline. It may be a really good reason (notice I didn’t say excuse) and that’s okay. So move on. It may be a terrible excuse (my wrestling coach told me once that excuses are like buttholes, we all have them and they all stink) and you can then figure out why you’re not devoting time to something that matters to you.

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Aspiring authors out there, set goals. Take some time and make sure you hit each point in the SMART goal method. And then, once they’re written, do one more step. Take your goals, print them out, and tape them to your bathroom mirror. When that is done, read them aloud every morning when you wake up, so its they’re on your mind all day, and every night before you go to bed, so they embed themselves in your subconscious. Will it guarantee success? My wrestler coach would say no, and I would agree, but it does get you one step closer.

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Have a great day and HAPPY READING!!!