Your Best Writing Year Yet! – Getting Started and Staying Motivated 1 – Part 3

THIS IS THE THIRD of a series on achieving your writing and productivity goals. In Part 2, you created an action plan for your Big Rock goal. (If you haven’t been following along, we suggest you start with Part 1 and read forward.)

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Today, I want to talk about how to get started and stay motivated.

Getting Started
For most people, once you’ve defined your first step, getting started is the easy part. That is, if you’ve broken your first step down into small enough tasks to feel easy. And that’s the key — not only to getting started but to staying started — each task should take so little effort and time that it’s a no-brainer to get it done.

Let me say that again, in a slightly different way — each task should feel so easy that it would be silly NOT to do it.

Let me give you an example of what easy looks like.

Let’s say that your goal is to write the first draft of your memoir, and your first step is to write an outline. Well, I don’t know about you, but writing an outline for an entire book seems pretty daunting to me. I might be inclined to put that off until I have “enough time” or “enough energy” to focus on it. And if you’ve never written an outline for a book — or even if you have, but this is a different kind of book — you might feel lost about how to get started and flounder around a little.

The answer to that floundering feeling is to break your steps down into minuscule, ridiculously easy tasks.

Break your steps down into minuscule, ridiculously easy tasks. CLICK TO TWEET
Here’s what’s not daunting to me as a first action: brainstorm scene ideas for 10 minutes.

My reaction to that task is, “I can do that. I can set a timer on my watch for 10 minutes and simply brainstorm.” Done!

Then what? Repeat that step, once each day, until I run out of ideas.

Then what? Task #2: Put the chapter titles in the order I think they should go. If that feels scary or like too much all at once, I can work on it for a specific amount of time and repeat until done, just like the first task.

Do you see how this works?

Staying Motivated
Okay, now that you’ve gotten started, you feel good. Anything seems possible, and then life happens. You get a flat tire, or unexpected guests show up during your writing time, or your kids get sick, throwing you completely off your planned schedule.

Interruptions and challenges are going to happen. The important part is to keep your goals in sight and not to let temporary obstructions get you down.

Achieving your goals is like a marathon, not a sprint. And just like running a marathon, it takes determination and a certain amount of grit to keep going, no matter what.

Keeping Your Goals in Sight – the Daily Review
The best way I know of keeping my goals front and center is to review them each morning. It takes less than five minutes. Here’s the process I recommend:

Read each goal and check off any tasks you accomplished the day before (if you haven’t checked them off already). Checking off tasks as you complete them will give you a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction.
Read the reasons you wrote down for achieving that goal. This step is important, because when challenges occur, reminding yourself WHY you wanted to do this in the first place will keep you going.
Decide on your next best step and write it down. Remember to make it easy and doable.
Schedule the time for that task into your day.
The truth is that life will do its best to get in your way, and if you don’t keep your goals front and center — every day — it’s far too easy to forget about them or to keep shoving them down the list of priorities.

What other ways can you keep your goals in sight and stay motivated?

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Amber Starfire offers coaching, classes, and books about writing at writingthroughlife.com

Your Best Writing Year Yet! – The Action Plan – Part 2

THIS IS THE SECOND of a new series designed to help you create and achieve your writing productivity goals. Part 1 showed you how to set your one-word intentional focus for the year and create your “big-rock” writing goal. Part 2 builds on the first, so if you haven’t read it yet, please do so now. Then come back and continue with Part 2.

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In last week’s article, Part 1, I showed you how to set your one-word intentional focus for the year and create your “big-rock” writing goal. Part 2 builds on the first, so if you haven’t read it yet, please do so now. Then come back and continue with Part 2.

First, A Word to Non-Goal Setters

I’d like to take a moment to address those of you who feel an aversion to setting goals. (If you’re already on board, skip to the “Moving On” section below.)

Did you look at last week’s article and think, “Goals work for some people but not for me”? If so, you’re not alone. Not by a long shot. Many people don’t like the idea of setting goals for a variety of reasons.

But here’s the thing: a goal is simply a destination. Do you normally just get in your car and drive without knowing where you want to go? Probably not.

So, ask yourself this: Where do I want to be as a writer in 6 months? 12 months?

Lay down your preconceptions of what it means to work towards a goal and trust me. The process I am laying out in this series works. If you really want to make progress in your writing life, re-read Part 1, create your one, big-rock writing goal, then meet us here again, at Moving On.

Moving On

By now, you have your one-word focus for the year and your Big-Rock SMART writing goal. If your goal is an achievement, you will have included your due date as part of your goals statement. For example, “To complete the final draft of my personal essay by March 1, 2018.”

If your Big-Rock goal is to establish a habit, you will have included your start date, how often you want to include this habit, and the date by which the habit will be established. For example: “To write 30 minutes each weekday for 6 months, starting January 2^nd.”

You will also have written down your motivation (the Whys) for accomplishing your goal. If you haven’t written your Why statement(s) yet, stop and do it now! This step is vitally important, because when life happens and things get hard you will need to refer back to your Why statements for encouragement and to remind yourself why you began this journey in the first place.

The next step is to break your goal down into small, doable baby steps (tasks), each with its own due date. So let’s get started.

 Your action plan is a living, breathing document.CLICK TO TWEET

Creating Your Achievement-Goal Action Plan

Brainstorm a list of baby steps you can take toward your goal. For example, if your goal is to complete a memoir that you’ve been working on, you might start with a list that includes items like this:

• Calculate how many words I need to write between now and [due date].
• Schedule writing time on calendar and set reminder.
• Outline chapters.
• Interview Aunt Jane.
• Read 2002 Journal entries for relevant info.

Next, put your list in the order in which you want to do the tasks and give each task a due date.

You will need to break some tasks into smaller sub-tasks. For example, the task of interviewing Aunt Jane can be broken down into 3 sub-tasks, each with its own due date: 1) Schedule Interview; 2) Write interview questions; 3) Conduct Interview.

Or, you may need to schedule 15 minutes per day for 1 week to read and notate your 2002 journal (or any other research).

Giving dates to your tasks can feel risky, but you can adjust these due dates later if you need to (more on that later in this series), so go ahead and be bold. It’s the due dates that give the tasks their power.

Put each task on a calendar and post where you can see it or set reminders on your smart phone — whatever works for you. I’m going to talk more about task management in the next article.

Creating Your Habit-Goal Action Plan

When establishing new habits, it’s equally important to start with baby steps. AND it’s important to decide what time of day you will integrate your new habit. Use an already established daily activity to spark your new behavior.

If your goal is to write for 30 minutes five days a week, figure out when you will write. Some ideas: upon awaking, after breakfast, before bed, after dinner, during lunch break, after work before coming home, when the kids are napping (though if you choose this one, also choose an alternate for those times the kids are not cooperating!)

Start small. Plan to write 10 minutes a day to start. When you’ve successfully written 10 minutes a day for a week or two, you can increase the time to 15 minutes. You’ll continue in this fashion until you’ve reached your goal of 30 minutes per weekday.

Important! Add the habit to your calendar and/or set a daily reminder on your phone.

What’s Next?

Do the first task on your list. If you can’t do the first task in one sitting, break it down into multiple tasks or schedule working on it a few minutes per day until it’s complete.

When the first task is complete, do the second. Don’t overlap.

Remember: your action plan is a living, breathing document that you will refine and adjust as you work toward your goal.

In the next article in this series, we’ll how to stay motivated and manage your tasks.

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So tell us, how will you get started? What’s the first task on your list?

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Amber Starfire offers coaching, classes, and books about writing at writingthroughlife.com