There And Back Again

OK, so I have The Hobbit on the brain, but I DID just have to read that book again, so that's a good enough reason for me. =)

I usually write up my yearly post closer to January 1, but this year I have been a bit delayed. I've been thinking a lot about 2011 and how fast it flew by. It zoomed by so fast that I hardly got anything done that I had intended. To me, this means I'm doing something wrong.

Perhaps I'm expecting too much of myself, perhaps I have too much on my to do lists and when I falter even just a little it drags me down and I feel like any of it is impossible. Or maybe I just need to find the right motivation to propel me forward. Even with raising a toddler, dealing with sickness, and managing my M.F.A. classes, I know I should be able to progress with my writing at a better rate than I have been.

And because of all these thoughts, I think I need to take a lesson from FlyLady.net I am a fluttering FlyBaby attempting to get my house in order as well as my writing. One of the big things FlyLady encourages is Baby Steps. Don't pile it all on, do a little at a time, and slowly add things in until they become habits.

I need to make my writing time into a habit, and to do that I need to start small. My main goal for my Writing Term project in my M.F.A. program is getting on a consistent writing schedule. THAT is my SINGLE goal for the year. This means writing every day, even if it is just 100 words.

And since I definitely need to take Baby Steps, I need to work on one habit at a time, and cut back on other things. This includes blogging.

I have made the decision to cut down (for now) on how often I blog. The writing has to come first - I need to start producing more instead of having novels linger for nearly a decade before a rough draft is done. I'm not going to set a blogging schedule for at least the first six months of the year. I'll blog when I find slivers of time, when I have a link or two to share, when I possibly have some essays from my classes to post, and if anyone decides they want to do a guest blog.

I do hope to start taking part in SFFS (Science Fiction Fantasy Saturday) some time soon (not this week yet, though), but I don't know how often I will participate.

I do hope that those of you who have enjoyed visiting my blog will still hang in there with me, even though there won't be as much content as there was in 2011.

So, I am ditching all the disappointments of 2011, and I am taking Baby Steps in 2012:

WRITE EVERY DAY

Eventually I'll get back to blogging every week, but I'm not going to rush myself or set a date.

Good luck to everyone with their goals and resolutions for 2012. Happy writing!

And don't forget to visit my Facebook Page and join in on Writing Quest if you dare - I will still be running it each month. There's an ambitious list of goals from many people for Writing Quest - January already!