Tag: Goal Setting

December Writing Challenge · Inspirational Musing · Uncategorized

Setting an Intention for the New Year

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Often at the beginning of yoga the teacher will talk to students about setting an intention for their practice. This is designed to help students focus their awareness and attention on a quality or virtue they want to cultivate on the mat. The thought is that by incorporating a specific quality or virtue into your practice, you will be able to carry it into your life off of the mat.

In the past, I would always select huge concepts like inner peace or patience as my intention. However, my awareness and attention during class was completely focused on either the inflexibility of my body and/or the difficulty of the pose. It isn’t a surprise that I rarely left class feeling any sense of inner peace or patience. During a recent class, I decided to set a basic intention of accepting my body for where it is. Whenever I had difficulty with a pose, I gently reminded myself that whatever I could do was enough. And as a result, not only did I leave class feeling more at peace, throughout the rest of the day I found myself being more gentle in my self-talk. That experience totally changed the way I experience yoga.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to set an intention, especially as we approach the New Year. The goals or resolutions that we set are determined by what we want to accomplish in the coming year. Lose weight. Find a job. Write a book. Publish book?. But these ideas come from our thinking mind rather than a longing from our highest self*. An intention is birthed at the core of our heart where we find our deepest truth. It’s our most heartfelt desire and realizing it leads to a sense of fulfillment.

We all want to experience the satisfaction of living a fulfilled life. So we set goals and make resolutions in January to guide our steps. But often, like my quest of inner peace in yoga class, we come away frustrate because our attention and focus drifts. We get too busy to go to the gym. We too tired after work to write, so we watch television instead. It takes too much effort to count points or whatever the diet requires. And at the end of the year we become a bunch of cynics, who don’t make resolutions because they “never stick”.   

What if instead we set a small intention for the year that speaks to our heart? It’s harder to figure out exactly what that should be, because we have to quiet our brain and actually listen to our heart. The heart is soft-spoken and easily discouraged. So give it time. Do that thing today that it’s urging you to do.

Go for a walk.

Read a book.

Take a nap.

Do whatever you need to do to listen. I’m going to paint.

Until next time. . .

Read more about Setting an Intention:

*Why Do We Set Intentions in Yoga?

Sankalpa: Going Beyond Resolutions

The Power Behind Setting An Intention In Yoga

Goal Setting · Quotes

Planning Your Work, Working Your Plan

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Summer is officially over.  It’s time to buckle down.  But it may be hard to get back into a routine if your productivity dropped off significantly during the last few months.  All the things you meant to do but didn’t get to may be spinning around in your head. That’s why you need a PLAN to help you focus on exactly what you want to get accomplished.

If you think about it, that’s just what schools do when they use a syllabus or a study plan. They outline the subject so that the objectives of the class are broken up into bite-size task. That way the students know what has to be done and can plan their time.

Now in the spirit of full disclosure, I have to confess I cringe at the thought of writing a syllabus. I used to put off writing them until the last possible moment and would end up scrambling before my first class to get it together. However, the activity of drafting a syllabus always helped me to think through the structure of the course. I’d build on what worked in the past and improve what didn’t.  I’d also think about timing and workflow.

I had a similar experience with writing study plans.  When I was a M.F.A. student, we had to write a new study plan at the beginning of each semester. Back then I thought they were a pain in the ass, but in retrospect they helped me to break up the work into manageable pieces.  I knew just how much I needed to complete in a given week.  And at the end of the semester, I could see tangible evidence of my progress.

So here’s how to develop your PLAN:

  1. Look back at your previous list of goals and write a few sentences listing your   accomplishments since January.  When we can acknowledge our successes, we’re more motivated to work on new goals.
  2. List five things you’d like to accomplish before the end of the year.  Write a positive action-oriented sentence for each item.  Example: I will write three new short stories.
  3. Ask yourself, what tasks have to be completed each month to move you closer to your goal.  Write a monthly task list. Make sure each item is measurable.  Example: Read one novel. Send out 10 resumes.
  4. Pick one day at the end of the month to check your progress. If you’ve completed your task for the month, give yourself a day or two to relax. It will motivate you to keep working your PLAN.
  5. Create a reward list for the successful completion of your PLAN.

Remember —

If you fail to plan, then you plan to fail.

Harvey MacKay

 

Uncategorized

Setting Your Writing Goals

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Starting a new writing project can be challenging. You have to decide what you want to accomplish and how to pace yourself. In other words, you have to set some writing goals. Knowing where you want to go helps to determine how to get there. Kind of like plugging in a destination into your GPS.

Far too often I plunge into my work without setting any goals. I just start writing. But so or later I come to a point where I’m not making any progress. That’s when I usually go back and clarify my aim for the piece. Setting writing goals enables you to focus your creativity. It’s time consuming, but makes writing a lot easier.

So the first step is to clarify your vision. I usually journal for fifteen to twenty minutes about what I want to accomplish. I ask myself a basic question — what are you trying to say with this piece? I play with a lot of different ideas without worrying about whether any of it makes sense, kind of like a brainstorming session. Then I go back through what I wrote and underline the phrases and sentences that excite me. I take those highlighted sections and look for a theme. Then I journal about those specific ideas until I have clarified my vision enough to start writing. Sometimes this takes a few days or even weeks. But it’s worth the effort. Whenever you get stuck, those journal entries can help you to refocus.

Once you have a firm idea of what you want to do, then it’s time to establish a deadline to complete the work. If we leave our writing too open-ended, it will never get done. Deadlines helps us to plan our time so we know how to pace ourselves. Word of caution — too much time and you may lose enthusiasm for the project. Too little time and you may feel frustrated and overwhelmed.

But even with deadlines it’s hard to get the work done unless you decide how much work you want to get done in each writing session. I have two friends who write together every Wednesday night for three hours. Another writer friend sets page limits. I vacillate between setting time limits and word targets. I use the time limits to make sure I keep my behind in the chair writing and the word target when I’m under a deadline. Either way, once I reach my daily goal, I give myself permission to stop writing and do something else. Some days I write well beyond my daily target. And other days I struggle. (I’ll share what to do on those days in another post.)

Your writing time will become more productive once you set a goal. You will also see where you need to set limits in the rest of your life. I find that when I have set writing goals I know when I need to say no to friends and family in order to finish my work. They also show me when I need say no to myself, especially when it comes to my guilty pleasure — Facebook.

I spend way more time than I care to admit scrolling through my Newsfeed. I’m always one click away from getting lost in cute pictures, funny videos, and interesting articles. When we first moved to Georgia, it was my only connection to the outside world. I didn’t know anyone other than my family. But now I have local friends, but unfortunately I’m addicted. I even volunteered to administer a Facebook Page for a friend’s business. But that’s a whole different subject for another post. It suffices to say the time I spend surfing would be better spent writing. Take inventory of how your spending your time. Is there some activity you need to limit to create more time for your writing?

Settings goals is also includes rewarding yourself. When you celebrate milestones along the way, it motivates you to keep going. It could be as simple as a little treat (chocolate and a glass of wine work for me) or a big gift (like a massage).

Don’t just read this post,though. Take some time to set your own writing goals. Check out my post on questions to consider when setting writing. Share your answers with someone. It adds another level of accountability. I know there are a lot of people who don’t want anyone to know they write. I’m here to support your efforts and will be glad to hold you accountable. So feel free to share your goals with me. Post them here or send me an email. I’d love to hear what you’re doing.

Until next time,

The Confident Writer