Turn Your New Year's Resolutions into Writing Goals

Happy New Year!

Tomorrow brings the first day of the New Year, and for many the downward spriral of failing resolutions. As the year marches forward, the good intentions of January 1st become daily afterthoughts, or postponed tasks. How do you keep this from happening to the list of resolutions you selected after a solid investment of time and reflection?

You don't....unless those resolutions go through a conversion and become goals. Goals are accomplished in measurable increments and have deadlines or due dates. Take a look at your list. Then, for each of your resolutions, write the steps required to accomplish them. Next, go through your calendar and select a due date for each step, followed by a deadline for completion of the actual goal. It's a little more work upfront, but the odds of success go up exponentially.

Here are a few suggested goals for the writing life in 2008:

1. Improve your current organizational systems, or if you don't have any, get some.
2. Get a planner and use it. I'm trying out the Franklin Covey 365 system from Target.
3. Learn how to sell yourself. In this competitive publishing world, auhtors have to be their own best publicist--just the way it is.
4. Get more and better sleep.
5. Get fit. Writing is not only about genius;it's about longevity--outlive the competition. You'll up your chances of large scale, long term publishing success.


Suggestions anyone?

Merry Christmas: Twelve Days of Books to Beg, Borrow or Buy

For some of us, the Christmas Season is just beginning. For the remainder of this week through January 5, we celebrate the birth of Jesus and look forward to the celebration of the arrival of the three kings, magi, in Bethlehem bearing gifts, which is celebrated on January 6. Many cite this tradition as the origin of a favorite Christmas carol, The Twelve Days of Christmas.

Even if you don't celebrate an extended Christmas season, it is still fun to stay in the spirit of giving as long as possible. It's why many of us loved singing the Twelve Days of Christmas as children. Here are a few gift ideas to get you started. Take advantage of the "After Christmas" sales and get something for yourself.

12. Writing Alone and With Others by Pat Schneider

11. How to Become a Famous Writer Before You're Dead by Ariel Gore

10. Writer Mama;How to Raise a Writing Career Alongside Your Kids
by Christina Katz

9. This Year You Write Your Novel by Walter Mosley

8. You Inc.; The Art of Selling Yourself by Harry Beckwith

7. Art That Pays; The Emerging Artist's Guide to Making A Living
by Adele Slaughter & Jeff Kober

6. The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn Iggulden and Hal Iggulden

5. The Daring Book for Girls byAndrea J. Buchanan and Miriam Peskowitz

4. For the Love of Letters; A 21st-Century Guide to the Art of Letter Writing
by Samara O'Shea

3. The Well-Fed Writer;Financial Self-Sufficiency As a Freelance Writer in Six Months or Less by Peter Bowman

2. The Renegade Writer: A Totally Unconventional Guide to Freelance Writing Success (The Renegade Writer's Freelance Writing series) by Linda Formichelli and Diana Burrell

1. Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts by Clive James

One Person Can Create at Least Part of a Solution

Cell mogul Mohammed Ibrahim offers a radical solution to solving Africa's ills.

Mohammed (Mo) Ibrahim, 61, is a Sudanese-born billionaire who made his fortune building Celtel, a mobile phone company that serves 15 African countries. He sold it in 2005 for $3.4 billion and is worth an estimated $2.5 billion today. Now he has a philanthropic idea that is as novel as it is potentially naive. On Oct. 22 his Mo Ibrahim Foundation will award its first $5 million annual prize to a former African head of state who has shown exemplary leadership in things like political freedom and promoting the rule of law. The prize, which dwarfs the $1.5 million Nobel Prize, will be spread out over ten years, with $200,000 a year after that.....(Read more.)


Why isn't there more foreign development in Africa?
Infrastructure and education. We also have a problem presenting a balanced view of Africa. The media by its nature is a hostage of time. Africa has its 15 seconds. And that 15 seconds is Mugabe, a dictator.----Mohammed Ibrahim

Source: Outfront; Forbes.com: 10/29/07