5 days until the new year, and five posts ahead of this one that you need to read for this post to make any sense. I’ve been putting up one per day and will do so until the end of the year. After that I’ll go back to other topics and Killing the Sacred Cows of Publishing.

Thanks, everyone for the comments on these, both with the posts and privately. Glad they are helping a little.

So onward.

The last post got into a lot of detail with examples, with luck trying to show you how to set the goal that fits what you are aiming at with your writing. The key is to really know what you want from your writing. Let me say this simply:

No writer is like any other writer.

Thus, when you hear some writer giving you some hard, fast rule about writing, some firm statement about how to write, about craft, you should run away. No rules, just what’s right for you and the story you are writing. I can’t tell you how many questions I answer about silly rules like “You can’t use first person.” or “Editors hate such-and-such.”

Now granted, there are some pretty solid business rules that fit almost everyone, but when it comes to producing pages, there are only patterns and how the brain works and that’s where you have to be honest with yourself. Every writer is different. Every writer looks at story and the production of story differently. So take my examples, take my suggestions, and warp them to fit who you are. They are just examples and suggestions. Not rules. Okay, we clear on that?

For example: One of the biggest myths in all of writing is that writing fast equals writing poorly and writing slowly equals writing better. Maybe for some, chances are no. The brain and your voice comes out when you clear the critical voice out. But some writers write slow. Not many long-term professional writers, granted, but some writers who sell do write very, very slowly. I honestly think they just take a lot of naps and do house chores. <g> But there are no fast rules. Try fast, try slow, and see which sells for you.

Try everything once or twice. Someone says “You shouldn’t write first person” write your next few stories or novels in first person. Why not? Works for Meg Cabot and James Patterson and many others. <g>

And then if something you try doesn’t work, try something different, try a new way, try a new math with a new set of goals. I shake my head at writers who say, “Oh, I can’t do it that way?” 99.99% of the time they have never tired it, but since they have been doing it another way, they just think they can’t do something different. What I find interesting is that when beginning writers say that to me. What I always want to ask (but never do) “Are you selling stories the way you are doing it now?” Of course, the answer is no, but no chance they will change, try something new, and I know for a fact those writers will likely not make it.

A title for this post could be “Avoiding Goal Failure” simply to get your attention. The simple truth is you can’t avoid it. You will fail, that’s a fact.

All of us fail all the time. Get used to it and get over it.

Writing is a series of linked failures and no story is perfect. Rejections are constant, the feeling of writing crap is pretty constant for most of us. Failure, at least in our heads, is always there. Always, no matter how many books we sell or awards we get.

Being around a lot of very successful authors over the years, I’ve always been amazed at how all of us are not happy with where we are at. We almost always think that in one way or another we’re failing. We’re not getting enough money or readers or that book of the heart didn’t sell or I got bad reviews or… or… or… The list is endless, trust me.

So what makes us, the long term pros, different from the beginning writer or the writer who has sold three books and then gives up when the selling of the 4th book gets tough?

Long term pros just keep going.

Something inside of all of us know, in one way or another, that failure is normal, that down-turns in careers are normal, that rejections are normal, and we just keep going. We have somehow trained that into our thinking when it comes to writing and it’s very deep.

Besides, we love telling stories, sitting alone playing in made-up worlds, living lives of characters we are creating. Oh, trust me, even with the failure, it’s a great job.

So, when you set these goals, prepare for failure at the same time. That’s why I worked hard to show that you have to build in the time for missing writing days, the time for just having a bad day, the time for being sick. And so on.

Now, let me make a suggestion to you, one that Kris and I follow.

Taking in story is important (movies and other books), research is important, plotting the next book is important, dealing with business and editors and contracts and page proofs is all important. But it’s not writing.

Sorry, let me say that again. It’s not writing.

Writing is sitting down and putting new words on the page. My suggestion to you is keep the line right there and things will get very simple for you in your goal setting.

So, let’s use my example from the previous post.

Dream: To sell five novels in five years. (You have four years to do this, since publishing and submissions works so slowly. And yes, I am ignoring two book contracts which means you only have to write one book to sell two.)

Figure to sell five, you had better write at least ten or twelve to start off with. So you need to try to produce three books per year.

Math works to 1,250 words per page each writing session (about 1 1/2 to 2 hours) 216 days of the year. Lots of days to miss and have off.

I got two different questions about “How do I make time to outline and get ready to write the next book?”

My suggestion. “Not in any of your writing time.”

Writing is putting new words on the page. If you feel you must outline every book, then try this: Type in a title, type the first sentence, and then the next and the next and just see where it goes. Why not? Afraid of failing? Have you ever tried it that way?

I have often written entire novels that way, and I have written entire novels from extremely detailed and long proposals and outlines as well. Both methods work fine for me, although I have to admit that when I don’t have a clue where the book and the characters are going, it gets exciting at times. And scary. And I always find myself on those books waking up in the middle of the night with ideas, or standing in the shower while the water gets cold while I work out a plot point. Those are fun books, but they are not the only way I write books. I have learned that each book is different and thus I never try to force a book into a certain method of writing.

So, if you are looking for excuses to not write, research and outlining are great ones. They feel like they are important, they feel like they need to be done, but the dishes need to be done as well. Just excuses.

Set your WRITING goals. All else works around the production of new pages.

You can’t avoid failure on these goals, so build it into the goal schedule.

Here is one final detail to think about.

Your goal for this next year is to write X-Number of pages, words, books, whatever you figure out. Think of yourself sitting down for a few minutes on New Year’s Eve, one year from now, and looking back at the year.

How will you feel if you hit your goal or went past it? Great, right? And full of energy to keep going.

How will you feel if you fell way short, spent all the time plotting and researching and didn’t get the pages done? Like crap, right? Discouraged.

So now, as you set your goal for 2009, be real, plan for failure, plan for missed time, and plan that if you do hit your goal, it will take you a large step toward your dream.

When you find that you have missed a week or so, remember how you will feel on December 31st if you give up. Then do as long term professional writers have trained themselves to do. Get back to work.

Plan for failure, but plan more for success. You won’t remember all the small failures and misses on December 31st next year if you hit your goal. Trust me on that.

Cheers, Dean

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