2021: New Year, New Goals

A person drawing and pointing at a Dream Big Set Goals Take Action chalk illustration.
Image Source: https://holisticlifebykate.com/2019/09/05/a-holistic-goal-setting-method-improve-in-every-sphere-of-your-life/

Welcome 2021!

I’m personally glad to be writing in this brand new year, although I’m just glad to have made it through 2020 when so many did not. I want to take a moment (if you’ll indulge me) to honor those who did not make it through the year, for whatever reason, and who are no longer with us–from celebrities, to family members, to regular citizens of all nations, to (yes, sadly) even my next door neighbor–who were not able to see 2021. All of them will be missed.

However, as is traditional, I did want to talk about some of the changes I’m making this year, both to the blog and in my life in general. This first post of the year is as good of a place to do that, so without further ado, here they are:

Hoping to Blog More

So, I’m hoping to blog more. I felt that I did a credible job blogging until the summer. Once the summer of 2020 hit, I found blogging to be a bit hard as many of the social issues that were happening were important enough (in my mind) that I wanted to let them have a voice. I also didn’t want to participate fully for fear of minimizing important issues, so I mostly let those issues take center stage.

I’m glad that I focused on social issues and asked my students during that winter/spring semester to find and work on a social issue project that was important to them. I think that my class (English 1020 Argumentation) really helped to ground them in how social issues are an important component of the “real world.” I genuinely hope that, even if they didn’t agree with the issues raised during the summer of 2020, my students were at least prepared for them and understood the context and argumentation taking place based on the class. This is one area where I wished that my students would let me know whether or not the class helped them in seeing this real world version of what we did in the classroom (and online after Covid hit).

From there, prepping for class (as mentioned in a previous post) took the bulk of my time and energy. However, I feel the best when I’m writing, so I would like to blog more. I’m folding my blogging time into my writing Tim (more on this below) so I doubt they’ll be a new blog entry every day, but hopefully I can manage one 2-3 times per week (perhaps more on those weekends that I can “bank” 1-2 entries as I’ve been trying to do for the better part of a year).

More Writing Time

So, I’m dedicating a specific time to write. It isn’t much, but my hope is that over the years it will grow. The difference is that I’m not going to say what time that is or how much time it is–I know what I’ve set and you should see the result of it via more blog posts, more finished writing projects (or more projects in various writing stages), more submissions, etc. If I’m keeping to my writing time, then you should be able to see it, but conversely, if I’m not, you should also be able to see it with a year that looks suspiciously like last year with very few blogs and a ton of projects started, but not finished.

Unlike past years, I’m making this writing time do for ALL my creative writing endeavors. On the days that there aren’t any blog entries, I should be working on creative writing projects. On the days I’m not working on creative writing, I should be working on my blog.

Dr. Rhonda McDaniel, currently serving as Head of the Graduate English Department at MTSU, sent out this awesome link just before the holidays and I hope that I’ve internalized it (but I plan to keep rereading it until I do). This was so timely and so helpful that I just have to give Dr. McDaniel a “shout-out” for sending this out (and “props” to the author Manya Whitaker as well). Here is the link: https://www.chronicle.com/article/how-to-find-a-writing-routine-that-works.

Doing Instead of Talking About Doing

And so this is the last great change that I want to talk about–in the past couple of years, I’ve really put the “cart before the horse” in wanting to talk about all the great projects that I’m working on in their various stages of completion.

However, I want to do them–not talk about them. So, I’m going to limit myself to discussing projects (especially writing ones) to those I’ve finished. I’ll do a Writer’s Memo on them and reflect on their genesis, their creation, and the problems and successes I had with them, but until I finish them, I’m not going to really talk about what I’m doing in the moment. This will probably go for movies, TV shows, and other genres as well, but I find that talking about things before I finish them really saps a lot of the enjoyment I get from doing those things.

In order to make up for this, I will probably do more and varied posts–there’s one that I want to do on a “BookTuber” who is making great content on Brandon Sanderson’s The Way of Kings, for instance. I’d like to talk about what she’s doing and how it is really helpful that she is doing it. This type of thing is what I’ll be adding in to take the place of what project I’m working on at the moment. I do hope that the Writer’s Memos that I talked about above become commonplace (because that will mean my creative writing/writing time shift has worked), but there will be (initially) less “real-time” peeks into what I’m currently working on (and my signature line may change slightly to reflect this going forward–although I may list one of the works that I’m really determined to finish–I’ve not yet fully decided).

Okay, so I should wrap this up–I’ve done three (fairly lengthy) sections. Another non-stated goal is that 3 sections is the maximum that I’m going for and that anything else will require another blog post later. I hope this is a happy and successful New Year for you (and myself as well) and I wish you all the best!

Sidney

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Currently Working On (January 2021):



Unhallowed (Weird Western Story)
Out to MarketStarlight, Starbright (Science Fiction Story)
Out to MarketThe Independent (Science Fiction Story)
Out to MarketProject Seas (Fantasy Story)
Planning: Completed, Rough Draft: Completed, First Draft: In Progress