New Year, New Writing: On realistic goal-making and a discount code for 2024!
Do we resolve not to resolve anything this year, or what?
Happy New Years to those who celebrate!
I want to start this new month off on a note of gratitude. Whether you are a paying or free subscriber, don’t miss an email, or don’t have time to open them at all, have just joined us, or have been here for a while, I truly appreciate each and every one of you and feel like we have something special going on. I look forward to every post I write for you, and feel seen as a human and a creative thinker in the comments that you’re generous enough to share. I’m so grateful for the different conversations we’ve started here—the questions we are trying to answer together, and for you showing up as yourself with courage and candidness about your successes and your disappointments and your hopes for your writing in the years ahead.
Which leads me to: resolutions! Do you make them? Make them and break them? Resolve not to resolve? If you are interested in some degree of accountability in 2024, I’m running a subscription sale in honor of the New Year. You can get 24% off new subscriptions from now until January 15th. Click this link to claim this offer if you’d like! It’s also available as a gift for family members and friends.
Now back to the topic of resolutions. Up until the pandemic, I was VERY BIG on New Year’s resolutions. Borderline obsessive about them, I’d make a hierarchy of resolutions and make sure to meet or exceed each of my wild goals. Then Covid hit, and like many people, I realized that I was pretty dang lucky to be alive, to have a family, to have paying work that I enjoy, so I pretty much resolved to stop making “resolutions” and instead beef up my gratitude for all the incredible things I already have.
But I’m still a Virgo and I’m still a workaholic, so I do begin each new year with a writing goal. In order to manage my own expectations, I like to create two goals: one that I have no control over (which is a “wish” more than a goal) and one I can control. I’ll share my two goals (or rather, my one goal and a wish) for 2024 in a minute, but first, I want to share two posts I’ve enjoyed from other Substack writers on the topic of resolutions and goal-making:
The first is from my friend Matt over at
“No Failure Only Practice.” In his latest Substack, he walks readers through “Process Goals” versus “Outcome Goals” which is a fascinating (and highly efficient) way to break your goals down in a way that mimics how the brain works. If you are working on a big revision this month (or year), Matt’s fantastic craft book “Refuse to be Done: How to Write and Rewrite a Novel in Three Drafts” can not be missed.1The second is from
over at “Unflattering,” where Dacy writes about letting go of resolutions because of the pressure it puts on maintaining them. Dacy explores these issues with a nod to weight loss and to body-related “resolutions” of all kinds, and she also includes some decluttering goals and pictures of clean spaces. If this is your jam, click here to read it, if it isn’t, do not!
Given that I’m big on accountability and time management, I thought it might be fun for us to share our 2024 writing /publishing goals with one another in the comments so we can cheer each other on.
If you’re game, break your hopes down into two parts like I do: “wishes” (an outcome you can’t control) and “goals” (something you can control). For example “I want to get an agent” is a wish: though you can certainly set yourself up to achieve this goal, you can’t control the outcome, while “I want to cut twenty thousand words from my novel” is something you can control for, so that would be a goal. Here are mine:
My wish for 2024: To edit and sell the novel I’ve been working on to a “Big 5” publisher.2
My goal for 2024: To launch a series of online masterclasses on a variety of craft and publishing topics.
Those are mine! Do you feel comfortable sharing yours? If you do, and I can help in any way with either of your goals, I will certainly weigh in.
Last week, I wrote about Blake Butler’s contentious memoir “Molly.” Here’s the link to read if you missed it.
Once again, thank you so much for being here. I love the community that we are building and I could not be more grateful for your support and participation and the great energy you bring here.
Remember to take advantage of the New Year’s sale if you’re not already a paid subscriber! And thank you if you are.
Happy 2024 to everyone. Let’s go meet our goals! I look forward to reading about yours in the comments.
xoxo
Courtney
Affiliate link! If you buy Matt’s book through this link I get a wee commission that I use to buy books on Bookshop.org myself.
Is it the Big Five? The Big Four? The Big One? Who can keep track! I’m just going to keep calling it the Big ol’ Five.
I wrote a historical fiction about the women who went whaling with their husbands, set during the Civil War, when whaleships became prey to Confederates. I had several agents say they loved it, but couldn't figure out how to make it relevant today. I decided to try to add a modern day whaling scientist who would be the descendant of one of my characters. I didn't know anything about whale scientists so was lucky to get an interview with a real one, who it turned out, actually was a descendant of a whaling wife. When I went to interview her she asked if I'd be willing to write a book with her (nonfiction, memoir), as it turned out, she was really quite famous. Like 600 million views on Youtube famous. I am published in both fiction and nonfiction. Where I couldn't get an agent for my historical novel, I got one in five days for this project. I am hoping the success of this book will help generate an interest in the whaling wives -- who I find so fascinating.
LOVE this.
My goal: to finish the draft of the novel I'm working on by summer 2024 (I'm using Matt Bell's book and I'm about to go sign up for his Substack)!
My wish: to sell it in a two book deal