Setting Clear Goals
How I’m Organizing my Writing for the Next Year, Part III
Unlike the fluctuating morass of 2018, this year I am setting clear goals and sticking to them. Without clear objectives, distractions and potentials will win out. The Gordian Knot was not cut because it was easy or even possible: It was undone because Alexander would not leave while it remained. He seized his destiny, and did not have the time to waste on becoming a knot expert.
I have seen many upsides to the freedom of an undisciplined, Bohemian lifestyle where I work on the idea that strikes my fancy at the moment and focus in self-improvement, learning, and networking. Committing to it as a lifestyle, however, would leave me living the poor, starving life that has robbed the world of many great artists and thinkers. Those jewels will never be replaced. Success relies on ambition, and nobody has to give anything up to have a clear vision and move toward it — but it does require vaulting hurdles and growing, changing. A reflective period is great, provided it gives renewed vigor after rising.
Still, vigor without direction dissipates with little effect. A cartridge with no bullet causes only temporary victory. I am a man of incredible synthetic thought, a world builder and an artist. I have spent thousands of hours helping people — friends, strangers, and clients alike — resolve fictional world problems and telling stories without any thought of monetizing them until recent years. In this season I enacted the policy of “Business First” because it is so easy for me to get distracted with a new idea, jotting down a character, quote, or plot. I focus on writing for effect so I can be free to write for pleasure. I take pleasure in polishing and then showing off good writing, sharing stories and seeing others get excited but to do that I need to make sure I’m funding my habit. I get money so I have free time. The more efficient my work, the more free time I get.
So does that mean my ideas are lost or wasted or that I’ve thrown away my sketches? No. “Business First” implies there is a second, and motivates me daily to improve. I can use my hobby as a carrot to reward my work instead of thinking of it as a vice. Having the constraint of work before play has opened up a twist of “art through adversity” to me: Can I make art out if my business? How can I make this business copy memorable with my familiarity with classical poetry, where skalds had to remember hundreds of lines or a reciter was expected to tell the whole of the Illiad? Can I teach someone how to write by demonstrating one of my own ideas just as efficiently as the cheap shots of critiquing other hardworking writers’ babies? Through these and other questions I create a synergy with my downtime, the hobby-reward feeding back into my productivity yet again. Constraints don’t mean zero fun. Focus by nature means excluding the stuff that is less than critical to your current phase of work. Focus is required to do anything mature and complete, even in a hobby.
While I have only shared one goal with you here, the precision of its wording should indicate that I was able to write extremely effective goals for myself. Clarify what you are becoming, and change it if you do not like the vision.
Let’s inspire one another and throw our hats in the ring: Write down a goal for yourself, either where you’ll see it every day or here in the comments. Encourage each other, for we are all chasing different dreams.
