Update Day: Missed It by That Much

Sigh. One of these days, I'll be able to actually get everything done in time. It would be so very nice. In case you guys are wondering what I'm on about, yesterday was the last Friday of the month, so that means it's time for another Update Day. And because I'm an absolutely terrible blog hop host, I didn't remember I was supposed to post an update until it was way too late for me to post an update. *Eye roll*

So how am I doing? Well, I actually did great for most of the month, but the wheels fell off a little bit this past week. I got distracted from my writing work, but you know what? I actually don't regret it. This past week I gave myself permission to do things just because I want to instead of because I have a goal to achieve a certain thing. Which was actually so refreshing.

Maybe it's a bit bad because it put me behind, but for now, I'm just going to go with it until the end of the month. My brain obviously needs the break.

At the same time, I've also got a lot of work done on the freelance side, and despite the fact that I'm behind, I still manage to write/edit over 40k words so far. So regardless of how I do for the rest of the month, I'm going to call this a win.

In short, I'm really proud of myself. I'm really making leaps and bounds when it comes to not only getting things done, but also on knowing when to ease off the acceleration. It's a bit unfortunate that it meant that I didn't quite get everything on time at the end of the month, though. :-/

But there's one good piece of news for me, though, and it's that I'm definitely starting to pull things back together, and any and all progress I might be making counts as a win.

How are you guys doing? 

Update Day: Taking Stock

Since it's the last Friday of the month, it's time for another GotGoals? Bloghop update. If you'd like to know what that means or how to join the bloghop, please click here.

I have to admit that today's post is kicking my butt. I've tried writing it twice, but there are things going on in my life that I just want to share, so it keeps coming out every time I try to write this post and taking over. The other reason is that this is kind of an important milestone.

On the one hand, it's the middle of the year. It's also the middle of my goal's five-year period after I hit reset on how I approached my goals. So it stands to reason that I should stop and take stock of everything I've achieved.

But... right now, that isn't working for me. At the heart of it, I'm currently busy with some really large-scale things, so it's been months since I've actually "achieved" anything that isn't related to my freelance work.

Still, this doesn't mean I'm failing. Until recently, I did feel like a constant failure. There is always something more to do. There is always something I could do better. So lately, I've started to fall into a trap of not seeing the progress I've made because it kept feeling like I'm falling short.

So I'm getting into the frame of mind of remembering that what I'm busy with right now is just as important as those goals I want to achieve.

With that in mind, this is what I'm working on right now: 

Book 3 of The War of Six Crowns

I had really hoped that I could publish this by now, but yeah. Life. I'm making progress, though. It's just taking longer than expected because of its length. It'll be worth the wait, though. 

Work

Yeah. That's really something that is taking over my life right now, but despite more than doubling my freelance rates, I've had two (or more) freelance jobs to do pretty much constantly since January. This is awesome, but it does have a massive impact on my productivity. That's why I'm now doing the next thing...

Building My Writing Momentum

My thinking around this activity was what woke me up to how hard I've been on myself. This whole thing of "Three years ago, I could write/edit 2k a day." Yeah. That's true. But the thing is, I don't count the writing and editing I do as a freelancer. If I really were to put a word value to the writing, editing, and research I do as a freelancer, I do 4.5k per day at minimum. (And sometimes as much as 16k.) Still, it's not really good enough for me to rest on my freelance success. The whole reason why I started freelancing was so I could have the security and time I need to work on my own fiction. 

So when I say I'm building my momentum, I'm really talking about writing 3k per day on my own writing. Or... about 7.5k per day in total. Is that completely insane? Maybe? 

Sorting Out My Communications

Recently, I've had to start studying up on branding and communications for my contract work. And man, did I learn a lot about what I'm doing wrong. So now I'm working on fixing all those things. This was what I've been talking about every time I mentioned the big decisions I'm making. In a lot of ways, the changes I need to make are down right terrifying. But I know there's no point to going on in the way I have been because it's just not working. But because there's so much to sort out, it's taking longer than I wanted to take.

One thing that I am starting to sort out really fast is my YouTube Channel. At the moment, I'm hosting weekly live write-ins on Saturdays at 5 P.M. South African Time (which is 11 A.M. EST). So if you'd like to hang out with me and some writing buddies I made with Camp NaNoWriMo while getting some writing and editing done, head over here and subscribe and hit the notification bell. That way, you'll know the moment I go live. Speaking of Camp NaNoWriMo...

Prepping for Camp NaNoWriMo

As part of my momentum-building effort, I've signed up for July's Camp NaNo. I'm aiming to write 60k words next month, but starting at around 1k words a day and working my way up with small daily increments. The idea is that by the end of the month, I'll be above the 2.5k per day level.

So yeah. Big things are going on here. Pretty exciting, really. What about you? Do you have any major stuff going on as you're going after your goal?

Update Day: Bringing the Madness Under Control

Friday was the last Friday of the month, which means it was time for Update Day. But I'm only posting now because my schedule hasn't really lightened up yet.

April was mad because of the massive job I got that had a deadline right around the end of the month. That went so well that the person who hired me in April hired me again in May. The job is a bit smaller, but its deadline was (you guessed it) on Friday. I had planned everything so that I could actually have time to write a post the way I'm supposed to, but the project kicked my butt in a MASSIVE way.

But here I am now. I've definitely made that decision I mentioned last time. It's actually a terrifying thing that I decided to do, but I know it's the right thing, which makes it exciting too. I'll be making the announcement next month because while I have a firm grip on what I'm doing, getting it done is going to take a lot of preparation... which is hard to do when you barely have time to take a proper breath.

I'll get there, though.

In other news, I did a large-scale overhaul of my lifestyle in May. This is part of my no-time problem, but I've decided to get a grip on my physical and mental health. I'm naming the two together because they're linked. I know I've been suffering from a LOT of stress, but I've been eating badly and skipping exercise, which made me sleep badly, which added to the stress.

So I just reached a point where I realized I had to sort that crap out. So now I'm eating healthier and walking more for exercise. Although it does cut into my schedule a bit (it's hard to be as productive while you're changing your diet), I'm really glad I did it. It's definitely helping me cope better and to think clearly about what it is that I'm doing.

Now the biggest thing for me for June is to keep to the healthy habits I'm building and to actually act on the decisions I've made this month. Wish me luck!

How are you doing? 

Update Day: Madness

Friday was the last Friday of the month, which means it was time for another Update Day. But I was so busy that I could do little more than to wave at the day as it passed me by.

In fact, the only reason why I'm even able to write this post now is because I have to back up the work I finished doing five minutes ago. It's past 10 p.m. on a Saturday night.

That said, it's not all bad news. The big reason why I've been this busy is that I had a record freelancing month. In fact, I did so well that I smashed my monthly earnings goal. *confetti!*

I'm really hoping I get more of these kinds of jobs in the future, and no, not just because of the money. (Although knowing I'll be able to stomp out some fires in the coming month is a nice feeling.) The truth is that I really enjoyed the work. The only thing is that next time, I'll make sure to give myself enough hours to get everything done. Because BOY did this take a lot to do.

Partially because of this, I didn't hit any of my other goals for this month. I have some major changes coming up that I'm going to announce soon, but April ended up being so crazy that I couldn't actually make the final decisions I needed to make.

So that's going into my to-do list for May.

Other than that, I did actually manage to get some editing done for Camp NaNoWriMo. The sad thing is that I did less than half of what I'd planned, simply because this freelance job meant that I had to give up my writing hours too.

Still, I'm seeing this month as a win. Sure, I had to give up some of my writing productivity, but I'm counting this as an investment towards a more stable future.

How did your month go? Any interesting news to share?

A Call for Help for Cyclone Idai Victims

It's the last Friday of March and so the first quarter of the year bites the dust. But other than that, it also means that it's time for another Got Goals? Bloghop Update Day. For those of you wondering what the bloghop is about: A bunch of us have set some crazy/super important goals, and Update Day is about sharing how we did.

The nice thing about doing this is the sense of accountability it gives. So if you would like to join in, just follow the instructions here.

But... Although I wanted to talk about some important changes that happened in my life, I just really can't get into the zone of talking myself when there's something massive going on right next door, so to speak. I tried doing it, but I just can't. It doesn't feel right, so I'll talk about all these things into the new month.

Cyclone Idai

Two weeks ago, a cyclone (which is the same a a hurricane) swept over three countries (Malawi, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe) just as it reached its peak intensity, and basically leveled everything in its path. This Guardian article describes the result as "apocalyptic", and the writer isn't wrong. Hundreds of people have died, and many are missing. Over a hundred thousand people are living in refugee camps because they lost everything. Over 2.5 million people are in need of aid. And the roads are so damaged that a lot of people can't even be reached. And now cholera has broken out in Mozambique.

So if you can help at all, please do. I'm linking up to three outreach programs I know of for those of you who want to donate. I'm not affiliated with any of these, and maybe there are other places that you know of that you prefer to be involved with. Or if you can't help financially, please spread the word.

Doctors Without Borders

Project Idai

The UN Refugee Agency

Update Day: Setting Goals

Believe it or not, it's the last Friday of the month, which means it's time for another Update Day. Since this post is about me finally setting my goals, get ready because it's going to be a long one.

To help you out, the first part is about how I'm doing and what I've been up to in February. Then at the first subheading, I start talking about how and why I set my goals.

I have to say, I'm feeling rather frustrated writing this. We're two months in and it still feels like I haven't really sorted anything out yet. I haven't been able to write since stopping in January.

It's just that nothing seems to fit into my days anymore except for work. I mean, I've decided on my goals at the end of January and have been keeping track of what I'm doing, but when I look at my "done" list for this month, it's all work-related with a few things like "unpack laundry" sneaked in.

Yeah. Right now, I'm still so busy that putting laundry (that I didn't even wash myself) into a cupboard is not a chore, but a daily goal.

So I'm finding that a tiiiiiiiiiny bit frustrating.

That said. I haven't only been working. The truth is, I feel like I've burned out last month much worse than I wanted to admit at the time. So much so that when I feel even a little tired (like after I've finished my work day), I just can't make myself write a much as a blog post, never mind working on fiction.

Instead, I've been working on some crafts. One of my best friends is expecting her second baby, so I'm busy crocheting a blanket. And when I don't feel like crocheting (because it's a bit less than nice to work with wool when it's this hot), I've been working on my needlepoint tapestry. I don't know if you guys even remember the one I'm talking about. I started it like three years ago.

It's a 138k-stitch monster of a thing. But I just felt like I wanted to work on it, so that's what I've been doing for fun. I'm finding it really soothing too, because it makes me not think about anything. How?

See those little ants running down one side of the black blocks, those are individual stitches. I'm working from a chart, and that means for every stitch I'm making, I'm counting up or down and then left to right. If I don't do that, I put the stitch in the wrong place, which is seriously going to suck because it's not really something that's easy to fix later. Because fixing a needlepoint tapestry stitch means ripping it and all of the other stitches I made with the same thread out and starting again.

So it absorbs a lot of attention and basically my usually noisy brain basically goes one two three four one two three stitch for hours on end.

But I digress. In January, I promised to share more information on my goals once I decided what they are, so here's what I did.

Starting Big and Drilling Down

Starting off, I decided to set multiple 5-year goals. These give me the framework of "Where do I want to be five years from now?" Some of them, I'm hoping to achieve in a shorter time, like my income goal, because I have already actively been working at that for a long time already. These goals are meant to be ambitious and can be as nebulous and "impossible" as I like. Why? Because the idea is to drill down into each one and find the things I can do daily to make them more possible. 

My Five-Year Goals Are: 

1) Earn $7500 a month from my writing and publishing skills

2) With a third of those earnings coming from publishing my own writing
3) Be healthier
4) The start-up I'm working on will be off the ground and self-sustaining
5) Do more art (that isn't writing)
6) Read more
7) Speak seven languages proficiently (if not fluently).

One thing worth noting here is that three of my goals is about "work" and three are about "don't work all the time, kid." It's basically about me looking to find a sense of balance. I can set up to ten of these goals, but for now I don't really want to do that because I think all of these goals are pretty big and all/consuming. So these are the ones I believe I can manage chasing at the same time.

From my five-year goals, I narrow down to my one-year goals. Now here is where I start to make my goals SMART.

For those of you wondering what SMART goals are, SMART is an acronym, which stands for:

S - specific, significant, stretching

M - measurable, meaningful, motivational

A - agreed upon, attainable, achievable, acceptable, action-oriented

R - realistic, relevant, reasonable, rewarding, results-oriented

T - time-based, time-bound, timely, tangible, trackable

Mostly my goals are specific, measurable, achievable, reasonable, and time-based.

In other words, by drilling down from my five-year goals, I take things that are mostly out of my sphere of control and doing the things I can control. Because each step I take brings me one step closer to making those impossible things possible.

My One-Year Goals

1) Write/Edit 250,000 words

2) Publish Wo6C3

3) Write Wo6C4

4) Read 12 books

5) Get to a healthier weight 

6) Finish one of my art WiPs

7) Improve my French

The top three goals are all writing goals, because right now, the own-writing side of my career is more of a priority right now and together they are aimed to add to my first two five-year goals. 

I set the goal of 12 books because that equates to one book a month, which feels doable, even if it is somewhat of a stretch. 

Given the approach I've taken to losing weight, I'm probably not going to hit my goal weight in one year, but I hope to at least be in a lower health-risk class be the end of the year. 

My art WiP will probably be the baby blanket I mentioned, because that has a June deadline. But if I do achieve my art goal, I'll probably just set another. 

With regards to improving my French and also my seven-language goal... I already speak four languages. In order of proficiency, those would be English, Afrikaans, French, and Mandarin. However the French and Mandarin are really more faded memories because I don't practice them enough. So the idea is for me to freshen up those two first before I move on to my next languages to learn. I'm still a bit torn on what I want those to be. I can go a really easy way and go for something like Dutch (which is close to Afrikaans), Spanish (close to French), and Italian (close to French and Spanish). Or I can go for more useful to me, which would be Spanish, German, and Arabic. Or I can just go be really random and go for something like Norwegian, Japanese, and Gaelic. I'll see what I feel like when my French and Mandarin are up to scratch again. 

Back to my goals. I broke my one-year goals down into quarter goals, which got broken down into monthly goals, which get broken down into weekly and daily goals. 

I try to limit the number of my quarterly and monthly goals to around five each, as it's more about focus than anything else. Weekly and daily goals can go up to ten each, and can relate to any of the bigger goals I've set. 

So for example, even though my yearly goal is about my weight, I can set a daily goal that's about my mental health because it relates to my five-year goal of being healthier. 

But since my quarterly goals are pretty much impossible, given that I couldn't do anything towards them for two of the three months, I'm going to skip to listing my monthly goals. 

Goals for March

1) Finish the freelance editing job I was booked for.

2) Write/edit 10,000 words.

3) Crochet 21 afghan squares for the baby blanket

4) Finish unpacking (yeah six months in and I'm still not done.) 

5) Read one book

So with the writing/editing goal, I'm not really being specific yet because I just want to get back into writing again. Once I can get into that routine, I can get back to focusing on any one project. 

With regards to reading one book, I'm actually in the middle of two books. One I'm reading for work (but also because it should benefit my writing/publishing goals) and one is in French, so either one I read will actually contribute to more than just my reading goal, which is handy. 

Bu yeah. I've finally set myself some goals. Now it's a matter of figuring out how the heck I'm going to achieve them. 

What about you? Do you set SMART goals? How's your year going so far? 

Update Day: Taking Action

Usually, Update Day is on the last Friday of the month, but even though last Friday really sneaked up on me, I actually did remember. It's just that I've been so crazy busy this month that I had my first mini burn-out on Friday and that lasted straight into the weekend.

Yes, I'm fully aware that having the first burn-out of the year within the first month of the year has to be some sort of record. But let me explain.

I managed to rest for all of three days before the extra jobs (as in the ones not associated with my main contract) came in. And boy did they. I had something like a bumper month where I never had fewer than two jobs to do at any one given time, and all of them were on short deadlines.

The problem with that was... I need to work a certain number of hours at the contract job to ensure I get the monthly income I need to make rent etc. and my editing work just seriously started cutting into my work hours. Except... if I only did my editing work that came in, I wouldn't make rent. So there was the problem.

I didn't want to let anyone down, but I also didn't want to not get my contract hours in. So.... I started working between 18 and 20 hours per day (including weekends) to get everything done. I managed that, but then had to increase my daily contract work hours to make up the shortfall because the editing still took up most of two weeks.

And then I suddenly had three projects that I had to finish writing in a week (plus the research). This I managed. But I literally had to work non-stop on Friday to get everything in.

So when I was done, and I still had my blog post to write, I just felt like crying.

At which point I decided to give myself the entire weekend off with no screens (except Netflix) so that I could recover.

Fortunately for me, I did.

But the thing is, it made me realize that I had to change something for my own well-being. 

I worked until I was exhausted and that also made me feel sick. And if I kept it up, I definitely would have derailed in some way or the other. But that did give me the impetus I needed to make a change I'd been worried about for months now...

My freelance rates and turnaround times. 

See, when I got started, I really stressed how fast I can work and how relatively inexpensive I was. It was my way of getting into the market. It was good, and for quite some time, I never felt the impact. First, because I didn't have anything else to do. Then because I basically entered a quiet editing time while working on my contract. 

But this month when everything crashed together, I realized that I could no longer deliver work in seven days unless I was compensated for the fact that I was taking time away from my other contracts. 

So I completely restructured the way I charge for my work, which you can check out on Fiverr. 

I used to be somewhat worried about making this change. What if my clients didn't come back? What if I didn't get any more orders? 

But the last month has shown me that I'm willing to only work on my contract rather than 1) burn out because I have too much to do or 2) take a knock on my income because I wanted to keep my editing prices low.

So that's basically what my January was about. How about you? Are you also working on changing things this year? How is it going?

Got Goals? Bloghop: Rethinking Things

Click here for more information or to join in.

I somehow managed to skip the entire month of December, which I suspect is something I've never done in all the years I've been blogging. But the truth is, I've been procrastinating on doing this post.

I've been looking for either that sense of optimism with which I attacked my goals pre-2014... or the grim-but-hidden-under-a-thin-veneer-of-optimistic determination I've resorted to since that damnable year, but as the end of 2018, I found very little other than introspection.

Yeah. As I'm writing this, I realize I'm either going to have to heavily self-censor before posting, or just accept the fact that sometimes, being honest means being a bit of a downer.

So maybe let's just start with some good news. That would be that I'm fairly certain that after five years of disaster following disaster... my family and I are doing... okay.

But the truth of the matter is that getting us here meant that I had to make some serious sacrifices in my writing, social networking, publishing, health... Basically almost every aspect of my life. So 2018 ended on a high note... But it also exacted the heavy cost of everything I'd tried to defer paying on for five years.

And... After the reckoning... I just realized that... I, the person you had known from this blog, had mostly been obliterated in 2014 and the years that followed. And as things grew harder and harder, the more I withdrew from social media, because I simply couldn't maintain a facade of being happy. And it's not just my social media. It's my social life in general. I have to admit that I largely withdrew from everything, simply because I couldn't stand the thought of lying, but also didn't want to be that person who complained and bemoaned their fate the whole time.

It didn't matter as much for the better part of five years, because there's barely breathing room to think about anything but surviving the next disaster. But now that the dust is settling, I'm starting to realize that almost nothing I had before is left to me. It's quite an isolating, indescribable feeling. Perhaps the closest thing I can relate it to was going into a war for my life and somehow managing to win... and still come home to discover I lost everything anyway.

Where does one go from there?

This is something I've been grappling with since November, but there are no easy answers. But this past five years have been the closest thing I've experienced to living in a story. Right down to the dastardly evil deeds, face-heel turns, and a massive climactic moment. Right now, I'm feeling like I'm at the resolution stage of that story. 

And I've learned I'm a being of incredible power and resilience. A force of nature of unlimited potential. 

But I find myself yearning back to easier times. Repeatedly trying to do things that hearken back to those times in the hope that if I can get back onto that track, I can go back to the same trajectory I had been on. 

The thing is... that's not possible anymore. 

It's kind of sad to realize, and yet, it's exciting too. Because at the heart of it, it means that I'm at a new chapter in my life. I get to start from scratch.

The problem I'm having as of now (and the reason why I left this post until the absolute last) is that I don't know how far I want to take this "from scratch" idea. Because I actually feel like I really have to re-evaluate my priorities and how I'm going about them.

Which means that some things that I've been doing for the better part of a decade might end up being cut out of my life or otherwise cut right down to the absolute basics.

So for now, I decided not to set any official goals other than my five-year goal of earning $7,500 per year from my writing skills. For now, I need to figure out what I want, in what order, before I lock myself in for the year.

How are you doing? Are you setting goals for 2019, or are you also holding off for a bit to figure out what you want? 

Update Day: Long-Term Planning vs Short-Term Gratification

It's the last Friday of the month, which means that it's Update Day. In case you're wondering what it's all about, a few of us writerly types went and set some major goals and we share updates on our progress toward those goals once a month. If you would like more information or to join in, click here.

So how'd I do?

Uh.

Yeah so I honestly have no idea where November went. I don't know if it's because of my life getting another curveball (a good one this time, fortunately), or if I'm just really that exhausted, but it keeps feeling like I'm stuck in a reactionary kind of mindset.

On the one hand, that's not too bad. At least the things I'm having to react to right now are mostly positive. But the problem is that I can't build anything when I'm spending 90% of my time reacting to unexpected events (and 10% recovering from that).

This is frustrating to me on a very deep level because I literally derive value out of building things toward my future.

But.

That said, that curveball I mentioned was about having to make an unexpected but massively important decision that might end up literally (Yes. I mean LITERALLY.) changing the world. So maybe I should cut myself some slack.

I guess the issue is that lately, the nature of the things I've been working on building toward have opposite qualities to the writing goals I've been pursuing. With my writing goals, I had this massive goal and no real certainty of how, or even if I'd be able to make it. So in lieu of that, I engaged in short-term goals that would give me a short-term sense of accomplishing something. For example, wanting to write 1,000 words per day meant that I might eventually be able to become successful as a writer. But in the meantime, I still had something written and created to show for my short-term efforts.

This thing I'm building on the side with my family... I'm 90% sure that it's going to be hugely successful if we can cross a few hurdles in the way. Here's the thing, though. Even if I do achieve something now, the impact is long-term. So in a month like this, where a significant portion of my mind-space was devoted to this project, I keep feeling like I spent my time on nothing. I guess because I'll only really see what I did today much later.

I'm kinda in the same place with the other thing that I've been focusing on this month. I joined a yoga challenge, where I do yoga for 30 days straight. I do feel better after every session, but I don't really "see" the impact until maybe a week or so later.

And really, my mind's not liking this lack of immediate gratification. I suspect it might be part of the reason why I've been so exhausted and drained. Last weekend, I took the two days to randomly pick items off my to-do list that have been waiting for months now. The happy coincidence of doing this was that most of the things I did meant I had something once I was done. Like unpacking boxes in my room meant that I have a slightly tidier room and the feeling that at least one thing (one box) was finished. Another thing I worked on was the wireframe for my temporary author website. This is something I've basically been threatening/promising myself to do since April. It's almost done. And every page I created for the site feels like a rush. So much so that I have no idea about whether it's any good, but just seeing something literally take shape under my hands was so good.

Takeaway lesson for me: Do something with a short-term benefit every now and then. Sometimes we get so stuck on long-term goals that we forget to just do things for the here and now. In December, I'm going to take off for a few days from Christmas into New Year, and I think for that week, I'll basically be indulging my whims around just creating whatever I feel like.

But for that to happen, I'm going to have to graft in the rest of the month to make up the "lost" hours from that week. So that means I'm going to continue being quiet until around New Year's Eve, as per my tradition of resetting my goals at the end of the year.

See you then! How are your goals going? Have any plans for December?