October 2018 Goals

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Goals are important - and I need to work on setting ones I can achieve. This is what I'm thinking for this month... 

On my plate:

As you know, I have several goals on the run at the moment, including 9 novels as part of a team, and 3 short stories for anthologies. In addition, I have a series of my own, and 1 more short story for December that I want to complete. On top of that, I am currently working on a second edition of my fantasy trilogy, compiling my science fiction series into a three-book compilation, and putting together a gift library for my newsletter subscribers.
Given that my life has been kicked on its head, right now, the work I’m doing for, and with, other folk, has to have work priority, and I have to do my best to make sure I fulfil those commitments, so, this month—and most of November, I’ll be kicking that along. That doesn’t mean I’m giving up on the rest, just that it needs to come next.
This means that my co-written series, which I’m calling MS, for now, and the short stories: SS2, SS3, and SS4, have to come first. Of those, I want to try to complete two novels in the series and all the short stories this month, so MS01 has 69,915 words remaining, MS02 will be around 90,000 words long, SS2 has 4,509 words remaining, and SS3 and SS4 will be around 8,000 words each. That’s a goal of 180,424 words for the month, which is not so bad.
There are 29 days left in the month, but I’m going to work on 28 because getting something back on track, or starting something from scratch, takes a little more time.
This means I will need to write a minimum of 6,444 words per day on these projects in order to make my goal.
If I wanted to finish the fifth novel in my science fiction series on top of that (27,714 words remaining), I would have to write a minimum of 7,444 words each day—and, if I want to add in December’s short story (8,000 words), I would have to write a minimum of 7,719 words each day.
All of those daily word goals (6,444, 7,444, 7,719) are doable BUT I also need to do publisher things like putting out this month’s short story, writing on my blog, updating the back matter in the stories I’ve published, adding titles to vendors I’m not on, yet, maintaining my social media presence, and that kind of thing—and all of those take time.
With this in mind, I’m going to go for around 6,500 words per day. If I write more, and have enough time to finish off my science fiction novel, I’ll try and fit that in, as well, but not until the main goals are done.
And you know what else? I have to hope things stay okay on the health and family fronts. If something comes up on either of those, then my goals will have to shift to accommodate that. Family is important. The work will still be there once I’ve looked after my family—otherwise, what is its purpose? Likewise with health; there’s no point in pushing through work, if it’s going to be second-rate because I’m sick. Working to get ahead of my goals will mean I have some swing room if something goes wrong on either of these fronts.

Final Goal Decisions:

Having gone through all that, I'm thinking I might try for something like the following: 
Writing Goals:
  1. Complete MS01 (69,915 words)
  2. Complete MS02 (90,000 words)
  3. Complete SS02 (4,509 words)
  4. Complete SS03 (8,000 words)
  5. Have SS04 outline completed (500 words)
  6. Complete SS04 (8,000 words)
This is a total of 6,462 words that need to be completed each day.
Publisher Goals:
  1. Edit, format and publish Harper & the Unicorn;
  2. Update the 10 short titles each week to each platform for a total of 50 titles this month;
  3. Put together newsletter gift;
  4. Write one blog post for each day of the month, from October 2nd through October 31st; and
  5. Cover, edit, format and publish What Happens on Axis 58… for an early November release.
Now, let’s see how we go…
Location: Canberra ACT 2601, Australia

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