Making Writing Plans Over the Christmas Holidays

As the famous ex-Beetle, John Lennon, once sang, “So this is Christmas, and what have you done? Another year over, and a new one just begun.”

This is now the time of year when we reflect on what we've achieved, or not, over the last 12 months, and make plans for what we're going to achieve in the next 12 months.

But that's not true, is it? It’s not what we do. It’s only what we THINK we do.

We don't PLAN what we're going to do. We only SAY what we're going to do, with no actual “plan” to make it happen.

But what if you did have a plan? A month-by-month, week-by-week, day-by-day plan for everything you want to achieve, whether it's saving money, losing weight, or doing more writing, or all three?

The best way to plan something, especially a long-term plan, is to write it down.

Write down what you want to achieve and then create a timeline of what you need to do every month, then every week and every day, to get there.

For the plan to work, your goals need to be specific. So, for example, using the previous three goals mentioned, you'd have to say exactly how much money you want to have in savings, exactly how much weight you want to lose, and how many words you want to write and what you'll be writing.

Then you need to figure out exactly how you're going to do it all.

I've been working on my plan over the last couple of weeks, and I found it unexpectedly enlightening as to how to actually execute what I want to do.

And the most amazing (and positive) thing was that when I broke it all down into smaller monthly, weekly and daily goals, it's not as big as I thought it was when I was looking at it as a 12-month goal.

For instance, if I wanted to write half a million words in a year, that breaks down to only an hour a day of writing. And if I wanted to save $10,000, I would only have to cut back my spending by $192 a week, which is achievable through simple things like careful grocery spending, making fewer car trips, and avoiding purchases that are only wants and not needs. But these are not my goals, but just an example.

With my actual plan already in place (and I've already started working on my plan), I know that I'll achieve my goals because I’m working on them daily, but I won't tell you what they are yet, because I don't want to jinx it. But knowing what I have to do in the short-term (monthly/weekly/daily) makes the plan remarkably easy to follow. And leaves no room for excuses.

But for now, I will tell you that by following my plan, I’ll be eating better and writing a hell of a lot more.

Click the link below to see where I got my ideas from, and read more about how to create a plan for your own 12-month goals.

The 12 Week Year: Get More Done in 12 Weeks than Others Do in 12 Months

Audio book:

https://amzn.to/4rFPOh0

Paperback:

https://amzn.to/4iB78Qi

My Muse Went on Vacation Without Me (An Update on My Writing)

I have a confession to make, but you’ve probably already noticed the problem.

My confession is that over the last few weeks/months, I’ve become really slack about keeping up with my writing. I haven’t even blogged here for over a month.

Naturally, I have plenty of excuses.

First off, you may remember that Dean and I spent weeks renovating our new house. During that time, we had issues with the tradies not doing the kitchen and bathroom correctly.  After the completion, we spent weeks arguing with them to get them to come back and fix what they did wrong, and to remove items from the final bill for the things that they charged incorrectly.

And if that wasn’t enough, when we left the rental house we were living in during the renovations, we struggled for three months to have our security bond returned to us. We finally had to issue a complaint with the Queensland Ombudsman, and guess what? We received the money a day later. 

And during this time, I also had a painful left arm that left me unable to do much. It turned out that I had several pinched nerves in my neck. I had injections to fix it, and now (so far) I’m back to normal physically, and the stress over the constant emails, form filling, phone calls, and letters has ceased now too.

So all in all, the last three months have had their challenges, including the weather, which is hot and humid, and we’ve had plenty of storms (summer here is in December, January & February).

But now I feel like my life is back to normal with no more fights over money, no stress, and no physical pain. So you should be hearing more from me from now on, and I’ll be back in my writing chair every day.

One good thing is that during this time of turbulence, I’ve sold many books. My most recent statement came a few days ago, and I’m assuming the large increase in book sales is due to the time of year.

But I wouldn’t have sold a lot of books if I hadn’t written them all. And now that it will soon be the New Year, it’s time to make plans for how much writing I’ll be doing in the next twelve months.

I’ve been reading about writing plans (and planning for other things in life too) and how to make a 12-month plan not only doable, but also how to stay on track and on target all year. 

I’ve already made my plan and got started on it, because I thought, Why wait? 

And soon I’ll tell you how it’s working, how much I’ve achieved and how you can do it too.