Making Your 2001 New Year's Resolutions a Reality

Making Your 2001 New Year's Resolutions a Reality!
by
Rogenna Brewer

Four thousand years ago, the Babylonians made resolutions part of their New Year's Celebration. A year or "cycle" was measured from the sewing of seeds in late spring through harvest in late fall. The four solar events, spring and autumn equinoxes and winter and summer solstices ushered in the seasons.

Today Americans kick off the New Year with Super Bowl Sunday. Pay taxes by April 15th, or else! Spring and fall are highlighted by sweeps weeks on network television, not to mention standard and daylight savings time. The final celebratory frenzy of the year starts in a count down of retail shopping days to Christmas and ends with a Tiffany ball dropping in Times Square.

And then we get to start all over again.

Millenniums, centuries, years are measured in months, weeks, and days on a calendar. And who doesn't look forward to the weekend? Days are measured in hours, minutes and seconds on a clock. Modern man even tracks time to a fraction of a second. An attempt to control time or fear of letting it slip away? Time is the ultimate currency. You can spend it, but you can't save it.

In 153 B.C. the Roman senate declared January 1 to be the start of a new year, but emperors and high-ranking officials manipulated their time in office by tampering with the length of months. To set the record straight Julius Caesar reset the calendar to January 1 in 46 B.C. following "the Year of Confusion" which lasted 445 days. Caesar's new calendar was called the Julian calendar.

According to our Roman based modern calendars 2001 is the dawn of a new millennium. But with last years claims of a "Y2K bug" and "millennium celebrations" maybe we've come full circle to "the Year of Confusion." As the 21st century begins it's the perfect time to make your New Year's resolutions and keep them.

While two of our most popular promises might be to lose weight and quit smoking, the Babylonians favored paying off debts and returning all borrowed farming tools and household utensils.

Assuming you've returned all those farming tools, I'll bet one of your resolutions as a writer is to get published. And if you're already published, to get published, again!

While chatting with an online buddy of mine we both realized that for years we'd been making the same two New Year's resolutions.

1) To get published.
2) To lose weight.

But for all our resolve we weren't getting the results we wanted. Even though I perceived myself as working hard toward both goals, and I eventually did get published, I began to wonder if it wasn't all just serendipitous because my resolutions remained relatively unchanged. Rather than repeat past mistakes I decided to brush up on goal setting to make this year count. Armed with books and tapes from the top motivators here's what I've learned:

In order to make resolutions a reality think SPAM. Goals must be Specific, Positive, require Action and are Measurable. They also must be written down.

GOALS MUST BE SPECIFIC.

The first step is to define your goals. You may never reach them if what you want is a vague idea floating around in your head. Or you may accidentally accomplish something and not know how to repeat your success.

Get out a pad of paper, use a notebook or your computer it really doesn't matter, just complete this sentence: I want... If you're like me you're probably going to fill up the page, that's okay, but once you've completed the exercise pick and choose your goals carefully. Remember your dreams may be limitless, but time and energy are limited resources. A concentrated effort will help you reach your goals. While a diluted effort is just that.

Now that you know what you want, bring it into focus. In other words be specific. The vague goal, I want to sell a manuscript. Needs to become, I want to sell ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X. The more specific you can make a goal the better. Which brings me to my next point.

GOALS MUST BE POSITIVE.

To want something isn't good enough. Change the above sentence into a positive affirmation. I will sell ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X. I had a similar affirmation for PUSS IN BOOTS which became SEAL IT WITH A KISS when I sold to the publisher I targeted in my affirmation.

Type up your affirmations in a fancy font and post them everywhere. Your computer and your bathroom mirror are ideal. Read and repeat often. This allows your subconscious mind to work with you. And believe me you have no better ally when it comes to accomplishing your goals.

The cover of my first book is framed and hanging on a wall in my office. I also have three other hanging frames in need of book covers. Each of these holds a positive affirmation for a future sale. Every time I enter my office I can't help but notice them. The cover of my second book, SIGN, SEAL, DELIVER! is already in progress, my editor has seen it, I have not, but the point is it will be replacing the next affirmation very soon.

Try it you won't be disappointed. However, you do have to apply your conscious mind as well. And that brings me to action!
GOALS REQUIRE ACTION.

You knew there was a catch to achieving your goals, right? If anything is going to get in the way it's action or lack there of. A manuscript will never be sold if it's isn't first written. And it will never be written if your fingers never touch the keyboard. And your fingers will never touch the keyboard if you don't put your butt in the chair. All goals require action.

And every goal needs an action plan. These action steps can be short term goals in themselves. I will put my butt in the chair six of seven days this week. Or I will put my butt in the chair today! However you word it this is your next exercise. What action are you going to take to accomplish your goal?

Having a plan of action with specific steps can help you accomplish anything you set your mind to. The highest achievable action step should be a goal within your control and have a deadline. Your plan should include a specific time line, which brings me to my next point.

GOALS ARE MEASURABLE.

How do you know when you've reached your goal if you don't have a yard stick. Create a time line for your action plan. I will sell ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X... By the end of 2001? A word of caution here, selling to Publisher X is actually not in your control, writing ALL ABOUT NOTHING is. While it's debatable whether or not selling can be a goal I'll step out on a limb here and say that "lofty goals" such as making that first sale or making the New York Times list are okay as long as they meet the criteria of SPAM.

"I will sell..." is Specific, Positive, requires Action and is Measurable because we're all going to hear about it when you get that phone call! It's just not within your control because it requires someone else to take action. And as much as we'd like to control others, we can't. Selling requires a buyer. So PUBLISHER X has to buy ALL ABOUT NOTHING in order for you to reach that particular goal. Don't discard these dreams, but be cautious about setting a time line for such goals.

I put an April '98 deadline on my first sale. And I did start exchanging emails with the editor who bought the manuscript around that time. But the actual call came June 1st. By that time I'd convinced myself I hadn't met my goal when actually I'd accomplished everything within my control.

Kenneth Atchity in A WRITER'S TIME says it best "Attach deadlines to your goals not to your dreams." So if it's your dream to be published or published again, go ahead, make that your goal. Be specific about what you want. Post visible positive affirmations. Create an action plan to accomplish all the action steps within your control. And you may just be crossing that want off your list next year.

Sample SPAM goal setting:

1) Identify your Specific goal or goals.
    I want to sell a manuscript.
2) Reword the goal into a Specific Positive affirmation.
    I will sell ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X.
3) Create an Specific Positive Action plan with action steps (in this sample I've started with a goal and worked the steps backward, which, of course, vary with the goal and the individual).
    I will sell ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X.
    I will submit ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X by 12/31/01.
    I will complete a final revision of ALL ABOUT NOTHING by 12/21/01
    I will enter ALL ABOUT NOTHING in contest ABC 8/31/01
    I will polish ALL ABOUT NOTHING by 8/21/01
    I will write a first draft of ALL ABOUT NOTHING by 6/30/01
    I will write the first three chapters of ALL ABOUT NOTHING by 3/31/01
    I will write x number of pages a day this month 1/31/01
    I will write five of seven days this week 1/08/01
    I will write today! 1/01/01
4) Your Specific Positive Action plan must be Measurable.
    I will submit ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X by 12/31/01 requires you to take action by a certain deadline. A deadline allows you to focus as you work toward that goal. The goal should be challenging, but don't be afraid to reset your time line if you've set an unrealistic standard.

Once you've submitted your manuscript you've done everything within your control, but it's okay to set your goal a little out of your reach. While I will sell ALL ABOUT NOTHING to PUBLISHER X requires action by someone else the goal can still be measured.

While waiting for April '01 and the release of her second Harlequin Superromance, SIGN, SEAL, DELIVER, Rogenna Brewer is busy setting goals for the new year which include writing and selling manuscripts to replace those empty frames with book covers.