My Measurable Author Goals

Who would have thought this post would be about writing? I was scrolling through Facebook last evening and noticed two of my highschool friends and their posts. One girl gave up her high paying job in California, sold everything she owns, and is a missionary overseas. The other girl participates in these crazy athletic events including running through mud, carrying heavy objects, running through fire, etc... and well, I put down my phone and said to my husband "I think I'm lacking direction in my life" which led us to a conversation that I'll explain more in the next paragraph.

I'm a driven person. When I was young, I was driven by perfect attendance awards, straight A report cards, swim meet wins, band medals, etc... and as I got older I set daily, weekly, yearly, and long term goals. I was driven by titles, pay raises, the success of my employer, the size of my vehicle, etc... Now, we have two businesses, two children, a baby on the way, and I volunteer as well as working in the arts as a musician and writer. Deep down I am probably trying to please my mother who still doesn't really care if I exist or not, but I'll leave that sort of diagnosing to a psychiatrist. My husband reassured me that I am a good mother, good at what I do with relationship building, and I think he said something about how cute I am - I sort of stopped listening as I formulated a plan. I came back with "I need some sort of measurable goal" I explained how a goal of being a 'good mother' was simply ridiculous because there's no way to measure the results and he agreed. We left it at that and I promised myself I would give this some thought.

This morning I came up with my action plan:

1) Continue doing book reviews - write a review policy and post it to my blog and website

2) Continue blogging - set a goal of 3 updates each week per blog (yikes - that's 9 total) in addition to the blogs on WOW! Women on Writing

3) Get back on track with my own novel and have it published before September 2014

Now - I am sharing these goals with you so you can hold me accountable. These goals are measurable, attainable, and now they are out here for everyone to see.

Stay tuned for more and thank you in advance for cheering me on! I may not be a missionary, a great mom, and I certainly cannot run through fire ... but now I've got some goals and I plan on exceeding them!!!

Hugs,
~Crystal