Happy New Year! I am kind of a nerd when it comes to organizing all of my New Years resolutions. I plan out overall goals, then I break those down into quarterly goals to then guide my monthly goals.

Last year, Julie Hedlund gave me a new perspective on goal setting. Instead of just looking at what I didn’t accomplish, she encourages to first start with what I did accomplish. Don’t get me wrong–I had A LOT of bumps and failures last year too. But it is helpful to come at my 2020 goals from a more positive position.

2019 Writing Successes

• Published 2 more poems
• Read 171 books
• Attended 2 writing conferences
• Participated in Madness! Poetry
• Wrote for the HWA Young Horror Blog
• Got 22 rejections (need lots of “no’s” to get the “yes”)
• Made a lot of progress on my WIP
• Didn’t let my blog die

Did I accomplish everything I wanted to? Heck no. But I’ll take the victories where I can get them.

And now on to my 2020 goals. A lot of these are focused around my main WIP, which I feel like I have been working on for AGES already.

2020 Goals

• Finish polishing my WIP
• Get an agent
• Write daily
• 100 rejections
• Write a poem a week
• Post to blog at least once a week
• read 150 books

I feel like these are pretty ambitious. I am attending the SCBWI Miami conference later this month, and I think that that’ll help move me in the right direction.

Just to keep myself accountable, here are my first quarter subgoals. I’ll check back in in late March with my quarterly successes and new subgoals.

First Quarter Goals

• Finish the WIP polish
• Put together an organized spreadsheet of potential agents
• Write 12 poems
• Post 24 blogposts
• Read 38 books

Alright! I’m feeling motivated! Now I’m off to get some writing done.