My Goals for ROW80--A Round of Words in 80 Days!

I’m fairly new to writing.

I’ve always been a writer wanna-be, but I’ve been getting more serious about writing and I’m trying to establish a writing habit and some goals. I have a short ebook that’s completely planned and mostly drafted and I have dreams of writing some fiction. I’ve been writing semi-frequently and really want to find a way to make that more consistent.


"fast fingers," by Katie Krueger is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

A major reason why I started this blog was to join up with ROW80—A Round of Words in 80 Days. Hello ROW80 members! I’m looking forward to reading your blogs and getting to know you.

The idea of a writer’s community really appeals to me and ROW80 sounds just right. Not too much pressure, but a prompt to set some goals and try to meet them, and some people expecting me to report in every few days. I’m excited about the chance to get to know other people who write, and I know setting specific, measurable goals along with some accountability will be really good for me. 

My Writing Goals
My writing goals for between now and the end of September are:

Find a writing community. Yay! One down already.

Write at least 5 days a week OR 9 hours a week. For now, as long as I’m writing five or more days a week, it’s okay even if it’s just for five minutes at a time. So far, once I sit down and get started, it’s been easy and fun to keep going, but sometimes the universe doesn’t cooperate and I have to stop sooner than I’d like. Eventually, I’ll probably want to be more regimented, but for now, I just want to see myself getting started most every day. If I don’t manage to write five days in a week, but somehow manage to hit 9 hours in a week (which is a lot for me), then all is forgiven. For now.

Finish the first draft and re-write of my non-fiction ebook. Back in June I thought I’d finished the first draft and started in with the re-write. But it turns out the first draft wasn’t near finished. Sigh. There were paragraphs and entire sections that needed to be added. So I’m moving through the book, re-writing what was written, and filling in the missing pieces with first draft writing. Which leaves me mostly through my first draft and partly through my 2nd draft.

"just write it," by alienation licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0

I can be such a dawdler, futzing and perfecting and never wrapping things up. I could write and re-write, and fine-tune until the end of time. Knowing myself, I already know I need to push myself to move on with it already (whatever "it" might be). I really think this goal is do-able by the end of September. Maybe even the end of August. 

Post to my new blog twice a week. Short and sweet. Remember the 80/20 rule and keep moving. I want to spend most of my writing time working on the book.

Find a way to incorporate writing with some gentle activity. I can’t go overboard in the exercise department, but it would be great to get into an exercise routine that will boost my creativity. Exercise that helps my writing won’t feel as much like time stolen from my writing.

So those are my plans. I’m still trying to learn what’s realistic, but this is what I'm shooting for.