January Update: New year, fresh start, old goals

Well, I left off last post not sure I'd actually do any writing in this New Year. And I didn't, to be honest. Not until the very last week. But. After a six-month hiatus...I am making a small amount of writing progress once again.

I talked about this in my main blog a bit, but it seems like half a year is about as long as I ever go without making at least some minimal writing progress. I can't ever stay away. I often need the long rests, especially when I've been hitting projects hard and pushing myself to reach challenging goals.

Which I feel I did last year. The fact that I wrote over 30k words on one novel over a few months was pretty intense. I always need breaks after that. And after the devastation of realizing how much work MystWatch 2 needs, it was difficult to make real progress on that one.

I did finish a whole SP novella. The end is garbage, but it has an ending. And oftentimes, I get to the end and think it's garbage, then go back and read and realize it's not as bad as all that. This was an important adventure, where the stakes get higher and the consequences bigger. It's where a shift in the series starts to happen. So, yeah. It was a hard one to wrap up. And while I don't love the execution of the last third of the story, I do like what happens, so I'm okay to keep going, at least. And I have a great first line for the last adventure of season 2! I'm excited to work on that this year.

Yeah. This year. I sat down at the beginning of January and made something of a plan for this year on my project timeline spreadsheet. As mentioned in my last post, it is mostly just finishing things I didn't finish last year. So finish writing Chain Letter Choice, finish editing MystWatch 2, write an outline for the next novel or two I want to write, and write 1-2 SP novellas. When I sat down to figure out the timeline for that, I got a bit overwhelmed. How does one finish a novel and edit a novel when one hasn't written or edited for half a year?

Well, one starts smaller.

I thought about starting with SP, but I didn't really have the energy for Sally's chaotic good energy. So. I am starting even smaller than that.

Short stories.

I haven't written a short story in awhile. I started a couple last year but never finished them. So, this year, these first two months, I am going to write short stories. I have three or four I want to play around with. The first is the next installment of Witch's Daughter. I'm almost finished. I have written up to the climax scene, then written notes for that, then started writing the resolution. I may not finish it by the end of the month, but I hope to. I should wrap up the month of January with around 5k words. Which is not the 8k words that will get me where I'd like to be by the end of this year. But. It's more words than I've written in the previous six months combined. So I'm counting it as a win.

Next month, I will probably try to write another short story. I have the knights unemployment office one that I really want to write, one about witches I started to write for Althea, one about little kids and a dragon that I'd like to finish for Althea (once I find an ending for it), and then, of course, the Makai short I've been toying with for awhile.

Now, I did put an editing month in for February between short story writing. We'll see how that turns out. Maybe I'll edit next month, maybe I'll write short stories, or maybe both. But yeah. Between now and the end of March, I'd like to finish at least a couple more short stories and start again on the Mystwatch 2 edit.

April is Camp NaNo, so I'll switch to Sally, then. She'll take a bulk of the following few months. She usually takes two months to write a complete adventure, and I'm hoping to write that consecutively this year like I did last year, because that worked pretty well. Once I finish month two of SP, I'll take a break month, where I'll try to outline my next novel. Then for the second round of Camp NaNo, I'll work on fixing and finishing SP 3.1, which I started writing ages ago. It needs massive edits to be able to fit the ending I want on it. So we'll see how that goes.

That puts me way beyond the first half of the year. If all that goes well, August will be more editing, September will be outlining another novel (probably the first Shane spinoff, because I've been thinking about him a lot, and I'll be working on Mystwatch edits in August), then October and November, I will dedicate to wrapping up Chain Letter Choice. I think it needs about 30k more words at this point. Ugh. So much longer than I ever meant for it to be (but I always write long, so that's no surprise). If I do a half-NaNo in November, I only need to do maybe 5k-10k in October.

Then, of course, December is a break. Or maybe one last short story. If I can finish three short stories this year, I will be tickled beyond belief.

And if I can finish all these other projects, as well, I will also be tickled. Maybe even to death. To finish CLC and season 2 of SP, finally edit Mystwatch 2 and get SP 3.1 in line with the rest of the series after starting it back before season 1 was even finished...that will feel so fucking amazing. I don't even care if I don't get any new novels outlined. Although I think it'd be nice to go into 2024 with at least a couple of novels ready to start into. Brand new stories.

Mystwatch 3 I think I had planned to poke at as far as editing this year, but we'll see. I may not have it in me. I may turn it over to my brother and sister for feedback. Since they devoured my other two books. Well, three, because both read Druid Wars, as well.

Anyway. As always, I've gotten way ahead of myself. I've written 4.5k words this year so far. Asking myself to write 70k more and edit a very broken novel seems like a lot.

But I've got 11 more months to face that.

So, yeah. My main goal this year is to finish old goals. So next year can be whatever I want it to be.

December Update: A Long Rest

So, my unintentional break ended up being more of an extended rest. The last few months have been difficult as far as my creativity goes. I've wanted to want to write, but in all honesty...it's been a relief not to. I go through this phase every now and then, where it's nice to pretend this isn't something I have to do.

Although more than that, I just haven't wanted to write. None of my stories felt interesting. I hated all of my characters. The physical act of writing sounded absolutely wretched. I couldn't even bring myself to read anything I'd written before. That's sometimes how I entice myself back to writing after a long break. Go back and read stuff I've written. It reminds me that I am a good writer and I do enjoy it. That I have lots of ideas and I do love my characters and worlds.

Finally, earlier this month, I was able to do that. I read some stuff I'd written and smiled. I am interested in my characters and my worlds again. But I'm still not ready to actually write, yet. I think I'm getting closer, but I'm still just worn so thin as far as writing inspiration. It won't take much to fray and give out, again.

So, I've decided to take the rest of this month to continue my long rest, as it were. No pressure. I've been doing some crafting and water color to meet my artistic needs, and that seems like enough, for now. I've also been reading a bunch. And even talking to my friends about writing, a bit.

The long and short of it is, even though I'm not writing now, I'm open to writing again sometime. I do hope it's sooner rather than later, but I can wait. I still have stories to tell. Books to finish. Ideas to play around with. Edits to make. To what end, I'm still not sure. Lisa seems convinced that I will publish, eventually. I'm not sure if I will or not. I'm not even sure I'm writing for anyone other than myself, at this point. Which is part of why it's hard to get motivated. And if I do the whole "maybe I will publish for just my small group of friends and family" to get motivated, it doesn't take long for that to blow up into "but maybe I will go ahead and publish on this publishing schedule and make all this money and write all these things."

It's such a delicate line to walk. And I fall off, a lot. Which is why I keep ending up here, after what looked like it was going to be such a productive year of getting things done, and instead, I stagnate halfway through.

Still, it's important to look back at what I have accomplished.

• I wrote 32k on Chain Letter Choice this year. That should have wrapped it up. It didn't. But I'm getting so much closer to the end, now.
• I spent a month on Mystwatch book 2, editing and making a plan for future edits. That included writing and scrapping a whole chapter.
• I finished SP 2.4, writing 20k words on it.
• I also edited three books for Lisa and a novella for Rachel.
• I brainstormed a lot of ideas and wrote some fanfic notes. Even started a couple of short stories.

So, despite not reaching all of my goals, I made really good progress. I don't want to lose sight of that.

My goal for next year is to check in with my writing each month and see how I feel. If I feel like writing, I will poke at projects. 

Projects with priority are

• Finish CLC
• Write a SP adventure
• Work on Mystwatch 2 edit
• Outline my next book (whether it's Druid Wars 2 or the first Shane novella or something else entirely new).

Mostly, finish up the things I didn't get to this year. Bonus things would be to finish two SP adventures instead of just one, actually finish the Mystwatch 2 edit, and actually start on my next book. But I'm going to aim small in hopes that I come out ahead, rather than aiming high and falling short, yet again.

I think I might take NaNo off my list of goals entirely. I love the idea of writing with abandon for a whole month to end up with 50k of a novel, but in reality, I'd rather go into it with a solid outline and take two or three months to write a solid 50k, not a rambling 50k. I do miss the idea of an exploration draft. But I just don't think I'm that kind of writer anymore. I can't go into something without a plan. Not the things I want to write, whether those are sequels or second-world fantasy stories. I think that, even though it's not done, I've shown with CLC that I can write off a detailed outline. And that I can spend two solid months writing the same book. I could probably do three, if I needed to, and that should be enough, if I'm fully immersed in a project, to write 45-60k.

Ugh. Why am I so slow?

Ugh. Why does it matter? This race is only with myself, and it's not even a race. It's...I don't know. I guess that's the problem. The goals keep changing, and what writing means to me keeps changing.

At any rate. I have lots of reflecting to do the next year. To answer those questions. To see if I can figure out what this is and when I need it and when I'm pushing too far or too hard. So. This blog isn't done. I still have lots of contemplation about writing to do and process. But this is my end-of-year post. This is it for this year.

I'll check back at the end of January to update on how things are going. Maybe they will be the same. Maybe January will be more thinking and flirting with writing and resting and crafting and painting.

But maybe, just maybe, I'll throw some words at a blank page or wrangle some existing ones that are mine and not someone else's.

We'll see.

Until then, farewell, 2022. Thank you for a year with more productivity than I probably deserved. And welcome 2023. May you be filled with creativity and joy.

August Update: A needed (if not wanted) break

This will be a short update. I did not write in August.

There. That's the update.

Although me being me, obviously I have more to say about it than that. Mostly that I didn't necessarily want or plan to take a break this month. Especially with last month being a kind-of break. But, as it turns out, I did manage to burn myself out a bit, I think, with even the casual goals I made.

Or I guess burnout isn't necessarily accurate. I just...don't want to write right now. Every time I settled down to write in July, it felt bad. This month, just thinking about writing felt bad. I felt loathing and disgust for all of my stories. None of my worlds were interesting. All of my characters were annoying. And I just didn't care what happened to any of them.

That realization hit about midway through the month, and rather than trying to salvage it, I just checked in with myself a few times to see if I felt differently. I never did, so I finally let it go.

I don't know what happened. I don't know if the month of August's energy is just off, or if it has to do with the moon or my energy level or what I've been reading lately. Or if it's just like every hobby that ebbs and flows.

Because as much as I have illusions of making money writing someday in retirement, the honest to goodness truth is that writing has become a hobby. And my hobbies I tend to pick up and put down as the mood strikes me.

As a hobby, there's a lot of "oh, I should do this thing," and then not doing it, then kind of shrugging of shoulders and realizing I didn't really want to do it that badly to begin with if I didn't make time for it. There's really no reason to push myself harder than that now that writing is only a hobby.

It is true that I have things I want to get finished. I have novels I want to finish, series I want to finish. And I have new things I want to start. But there are only so many hours in a day and I have a finite amount of energy. The last month, I've been focused on getting myself outside, moving my body, trying to find a balance of the things I consume. I spent a lot of this year fighting depression, and now that I'm connecting with nature again, that has subsided. I only cried for about ten seconds on Mom's birthday yesterday, and was only sad for about an hour.

I don't by any means believe I am done writing. The desire to return to my worlds and my characters and tell their stories will come back. It always does. But I don't want to force it. There's just no reason. My life is shifting focus. I just got a big raise at work, so I'm committed to seeing this through til retirement. I have savings plans in place to make sure I don't have to work in retirement unless I want to. I had thought about putting aside freelance money to fund the self-publishing of Mystwatch. But right now, I'd rather put that money toward other goals.

So, yeah. As of right now, this last day of August, I haven't written for over a month, and I feel okay about it. I may give it more of a shot in September. But I do have another freelance project coming, so I may focus on that instead.

At the very least, I will probably do some thinking and some shifting of my schedule to see what all I can still commit to finishing this year. Mystwatch 2 is definitely off the table. I just need to decide between CLC and SP. And then decide what my plan is for November. Whether I actually do NaNo or not. Or a half NaNo.

I will let y'all know how September turns out. Hopefully with more words written than the last two months combined! Take care, and have a great month.