Writers in the Storm

by Kris Maze

The end of 2021 will soon be here and it’s time to double down on annual writing goals. This year, I took a focused approach to the business of writing. If you are struggling to end the year strong, read on. There are many processes you could try in this little "writer pep talk."

Employing tactics useful for adult learners, I found ways to streamline my writing goals and built in time for reflection. Borrowing from psychology, education, and management theories, these practices have enhanced my author life. Now my writing life brings me more satisfaction, higher word count, and stronger goal completion.

Mental Blocks to Writing

It is common for writers to battle mental hurdles like:

• Self-doubt
• Imposter syndrome
• Plain old drudgery of life

These road bumps happen with every novel, but we don't want these to derail our ambition to craft stories.

Writer Friends, we don't have to let these subtle beasts undermine our talent. With some intentional planning and personal discipline, writers can set themselves up for success.

Writing fiction is a unique career because we work alone, talk about people and events that never happened, and delight in the imaginary worlds in our heads and hearts. It is easy to get off track and neglect those worlds we create when the real-world buts in.

Weird, right? But since you are reading this, you just might be in the same little club. You get it. You want more from your writing. Because you have a taste of the writing life, which always seems to entice us from around the next page of the career.

Taking Control of Your Authorpreneurship

If you want to engage in a process that lets you take control of your authorpreneurship, and gives you peace of mind. You get to spend your creative energy in ways that you approve, and that moves your career forward. Below are some suggestions.

Hold Your Own Business Meeting

Business meetings for your author life are one of the techniques I used to stay on track this year. Most writers who persevere with this work are self-starters.

If you are not feeling like the self-starting author today, there are ways to push through on your own. Before you hide away in your imagination and slowly let the world erode your writing presence from the page, consider the following…

One of my best ways to re-center my writing momentum is to reflect on my big author goals. Every 2 months the last 2 years, I have held a little, but very official, business meeting with myself. And I follow the steps common in any official meeting:

1. Read the minutes from my last meeting
2. Reflect on my yearly goals to date and determine how relevant they still are
3. Identify the semi-monthly goals and their successes–and celebrate with a crisp high-five
4. Check in on my plan’s progress or lack of and make assumptions why
5. Assess my current plans, including: what I am working on, how much time I need to finish each task, and what time I have available
6. Plot the tasks in an upcoming monthly goal planner. This one starts as a list, which I then flesh out in a spreadsheet, and assign into my tentative calendar.

Although the actual process is more akin to a teenager having a meaningful talk in the bathroom mirror, I make the business meeting official.

As the CEO of my author company, I dress the part (comfy clothes required), take a seat at my work spot, provide warm caffeinated beverages and light snacks at the center of the table, and wear my thick serious-toned glasses. I set a time, 10 am prompt, and stick to a schedule, so I respect my own time.

Are you still with me? You, my writer friend, are the CEO of your dream. Treat that honor with the respect it deserves.

Doubling Down on Authorpreneurship

You may not feel like an authorpreneur, but writers are in the business of creating a product (stories!) and connecting it to their buyers (reading audiences!) Even though the last couple of years have been extra challenging for creatives, it has also opened the door to new ways of publishing and writing.

It's true. The business side of publishing is sometimes intimidating and time-consuming. Let’s face it, there are more writers hesitant about marketing and showcasing their work than not.

Marketing yourself as an author is scary for many writers because it is personal, public, and mostly uncharted territory.

Writers need to be wary and savvy about what they really want to accomplish so they can avoid many publishing pitfalls. It's important to find your writing circle, which hopefully includes a multitude of caring individuals in publishing who will edify and strengthen your writing life.

Why Authors Need Time for Reflection

Reflection is imperative to becoming a better author.

As writers working in our own lanes, how can we take charge of our own improvement? John Dewey, a social reformer and educator, and the founder of pragmatism, changed the fundamental approaches to teaching and learning in the early 1900s. Without geeking out too much, we can sum his main cycle of inquiry up in this quote:

“(Personal Learning consists of) active, persistent, and consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it, and further conclusions to which it leads.”

John Dewey

Phew. That’s a bit to unpack. To summarize, writers can use Dewey's theory to deepen their writing life and be more mindful as they travel their own personal road to publication.

What Does "Writing Reflection" Look Like?

How does a busy writer include the practice of reflection into their writing life, without feeling like it's "just another task" to add to their mile-long to-do list?

1. Start by engaging actively in your reflection. What are you working on now in your writing career?
2. Find “ground that supports it” What you observe now in your writing life?
3. Move upon the discoveries you find. What actions can you take now?
4. Rinse and repeat.

The process is a series of cyclical steps, so keep moving forward and grow in your author career.

“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”

Will Rogers (horseman, radio and TV entertainer)

Final Thoughts

This digital age provides many opportunities to connect with other writers, to collaborate and learn from one another.  But there's little that can match the benefits of hard work and personal reflection -- the act of being present -- to spur us forward in our growth as writers.

Stay tuned, partners... In a future post, I'm gathering the many resources available for writers to self-study and master the hard-to-learn pinch points of authorpreneurship.

Until next time, Keep on writing!

What ways to you keep yourself on track as a writer? What tips do you have for our readers? Do you have valuable self-study resources for me to include in my next post? Please share them in the comments below.

About Kris

Kris Maze writes for various publications including Practical Advice for Teachers of Heritage Learners of Spanish and award-winning blog Writers in the Storm where she is also a host.

She published a YA dystopian novel by a small press in the summer of 2020. Lately, she has been entering and placing in writing competitions, such as NYC Midnight’s Short Story and Micro-fiction contests. You can find her YA horror stories and keep up with her author events at her website.

Photo Credit: Kris Maze (with some help from Canva)

by Ellen Buikema

For many of my teaching years, I used SMART goals for my learning disabled (LD) students as a part of their Individualized Educational Plans (IEP). These students needed to learn how to use their academic strengths to find a way around their learning impediments. Setting these objectives, and writing them down, provided many benefits, including helping them focus on their goals.

A SMART goal is:

• Specific

Narrow goals are more effective for planning. Specific goals aren’t overwhelming because they take a large task like writing a novel or getting published and break it into small, manageable chunks.

• Measurable

Define evidence of progress. You can define your goal by number of pages, chapters, or short stories, or by word count. Quantifying your goal gives you an accurate sense of how much effort and time you need to succeed.

• Attainable

Make sure your goal is reasonable, but consider making your goals public—letting critique partners or other friends know. This way you are more likely to actually achieve your goal. People will ask about your progress!

• Relevant

Align goals with your long-term plans. The goal should tie directly your plans. If you can’t see how the goal drives you forward, that goal isn’t relevant enough to get you to your desired outcome.

• Time-based

Set a realistic end-date. Time limits create a sense of urgency and help you track your performance as time moves forward.

A writing goal for an upper elementary student might look like this:

When given a topic, STUDENT will write creative short stories, descriptive paragraphs, or narratives with 80% accuracy in 4 out of 5 trials. This skeletal goal would then be fleshed out to be individualized for the student’s need in a specific class.

SMART goals can be used for any topic—business or personal life.

Consider weight loss. Instead of saying, “I’m going to lose the extra pounds I gained over the holidays,” make it a SMART goal.

New SMART goal: “I will lose XX pounds and fit into my jeans, looking fabulous, by the end of March.”

Specific            XX pounds

Measurable      use the scale

Attainable        make it realistic

Relevant          why do you want it

Time-based      influence yourself to take action

A lot of thought should be placed on the Attainable and Relevant aspects of these goals.

Consider relevance. What does this writing goal, or project, mean to me? How does it fit into my long-term goals? Awareness of why you write helps with the how and when.

Regarding attainable, be realistic. Are your goals possible in terms of available resources? It’s important to consider anything that might delay your goal.

Writing Specific SMART goals

Type of goal   Aspect of task

Specific            Draft first page
Measurable      Write 500 words
Attainable        Write pre-movie tonight
Relevant          Finish first chapter
Time-based      One hour after dinner

This SMART goal for writing is:

“I will write 500 words after dinner and before turning on Netflix to get a good start on finishing the current chapter.”

Sample Marketing SMART Goal for Writers

“Grow monthly subscribers by 50 readers per month by creating targeted social media advertisements for three social media platforms: X, Y, and Z.”

Sample General Business SMART Goal

“Our goal is to (quantifiable objective) by (timeframe or deadline). (Key players or teams) will accomplish this goal by (steps taken to achieve the goal). Accomplishing this goal will (result or benefit).”

A Few More Examples of SMART Goals

• “I will finish my manuscript by the end of the December.”
• “I’ll set aside 30 minutes in the morning to write at least 5 days a week.”
• “I’ll have an outline for my memoir completed by June 1.”

A Few Examples of Not-so-SMART Goals

• “I really want to finish my manuscript.” (Not specific.)
• “I’ll write gobs more this year.” (Not measurable.)
• “I’ll write 20,000 words each week this year.” (Not achievable unless you are super prolific and have nothing else to do.)
• “I feel like I should probably start writing again one of these days.” (Why?)
• “I hereby promise that I’ll work on my memoir until it’s completed.” (When? Not time-based.)

How to accomplish your goals

1. Write them down

Thinking about your goals fires-up the right, creative side of the brain. Whereas writing the goal stimulates the right, logical side.

The simple act of writing goals can nudge your subconscious, freeing it to find new ideas, now that it’s not preoccupied with thinking about the goals.

2. Check in with a writing buddy

Any goal worth achieving won’t happen in a day. It’s important to check your progress regularly to be sure you keep on track. A weekly meeting for “How’s the writing going?” is highly beneficial and occasionally, good therapy.

Having those recurring opportunities for feedback keep everybody motivated, which is especially important for writing goals that span months, possibly years.

3. Celebrate wins along the way

Don’t wait until the major goal is accomplished. Celebrate the little wins along the way.

Set small, incremental goals much like little story arcs within the main arc and cheer each other along when you achieve them. That feels great, which in turn encourages you to move forward to achieve the overarching goal.

SMART Goals and NaNoWriMo

The National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) is a fantastic example of using SMART goals. I believe it is the embodiment of this type of goal.

Writers from all over join this awesome writing marathon of sorts. The goal is to write a novel in one month, writing 50,000 words during that time. A thorough explanation of how NaNo works is here.

I tried NaNoWriMo for the first-time last year. I wrote approximately the recommended amount of daily word count and actually wrote those 50,000 words.

We were living off the Sea of Cortez. The area is super loud starting in the mid to late afternoon and into the evening, so I wrote during the morning.

Banda music is big there and not my favorite thing.

If you have never joined NaNoWriMo, I encourage you to try. I was amazed at what I accomplished. I’m still editing that manuscript, but that’s a story for another day.

Do you use SMART goals for writing or any other activity?  What do you do to accomplish your goals?

* * * * * *

About Ellen

Author, speaker, and former teacher, Ellen L. Buikema has written non-fiction for parents and a series of chapter books for children with stories encouraging the development of empathy—sprinkling humor wherever possible. Her Works In Progress are, The Hobo Code, YA historical fiction and Crystal Memories, YA fantasy.

Find her at http://ellenbuikema.com or on Amazon.

Top Image by Wokandapix from Pixabay

Mazatlan sunset photographed by me in March of 2020

by Lisa Norman

The holidays are coming! As writers, we know this is a powerful gift-giving season, and we hope that people will give our books as gifts. As readers, we treasure these hand-chosen gifts of entertainment or enlightenment, knowing that friends have given us something they know we will love.

But this year, there's a problem...or rather a whole bunch of problems. I'd already been working on this article when I was invited to attend a summit meeting on the state of the publishing industry right now. Every speaker started with, "I want to say something positive. But..."

Have you heard?

There's a paper shortage.

Not a toilet paper shortage...a paper shortage.

The cost of wood has increased. Paper mills were reducing production before the pandemic due to decreased demand, but that demand is increasing.

Problem: the pandemic has made it very difficult to increase production of anything due to labor shortages. We could theoretically import paper, but shipping costs are outrageous and the shortages are global.

Much of the material that would normally become paper that could be printed on is instead being made into cardboard boxes. Book manufacturers are wondering if we can use different grades of material to make the paper used in books. Printers are being allocated only so much paper. The problem isn't with the size of their orders, but how much their suppliers can send. Publishers and printers are having to decide which of the many orders they have that they can fulfill. In essence, they are considering rationing the supplies they have.

I'm not even going to talk about the shortages of packing tape, glue, or the special fibers used in making hardcovers.

There's an ink shortage.

Ethanol is used in making ink. Ethanol is also used in the production of disinfectants and the products we use to sanitize surfaces. Medical environments are being given priority access to this limited resource.

There's also a labor shortage.

People are nervous about returning to work while the pandemic continues to make itself felt. Those who can retire early are taking this opportunity. In the book world, this means that we're dealing with a shortage of people to run the presses, stock the warehouses, and drive the trucks.

The printing industry tends to run on an older workforce.

One statistic quoted in the summit was that 1.2 million people over 55 have retired due to COVID. One printer said that Walmart is paying their employees better than they can afford to, and they get full benefits right away. The manual labor needed to run presses, box up the books, and put them on trucks is getting harder and harder to find.

Many printers have closed their doors or gone bankrupt.

Then there's the shipping crisis.

Shipping prices have increased dramatically over the last year as snarls in the Panama Canal and major shipping ports all over the world have caused disruptions. Bottlenecks are causing shortages of shipping containers, while many shipping containers sit on ships around the world, waiting to be unloaded. The cost of shipping has quadrupled.

And of course, the post office is slowing down, too.

In short, the supply chain is a mess.

Holidays are always busy times for printers.

Publishers know they need to plan print orders carefully around the end of the year. What will be the most popular gift book of the season? They need to make sure those are in stock. Chatter in the publishing industry is growing more concerned as publishers place their holiday orders earlier, hoping to get the stock they need in time.

What does this mean for the book industry?

Ingram, one of the largest printers and wholesale fulfillment centers, has announced that they are raising prices for printing in November. We're seeing other printing venues, many of which rely on printers run by Ingram, raising their printing rates as well.

Ingram has asked publishers to consider switching to a print-on-demand model, the same model used by indie authors and publishers.

Traditional publishing and the distributors that manage their books have decided to increase their large orders and order early for the holidays. They have no intention of switching to print-on-demand except under extreme circumstances. (One statistic showed that during the Black Lives Matter movement, when the NYT bestseller list was full of unpredicted titles, 70% of the books sold during that time were print-on-demand.)

My Thoughts About All This

I've been watching this develop and doing a lot of thinking.

• Print books aren't going away. People love books.
• Print books are going to be more expensive to produce. People are going to have to get used to paying more for the privilege of reading printed books, at least in the short term.
• It is possible that alternative fibers may be used.
• Automation is increasing, so more books can be printed with fewer human hours invested.
• People will need to be patient. Deliveries will be delayed. Giving physical books as gifts may become more of a challenge.

Is there an upside?

Actually, there are a few.

• Book sales are increasing, depending on what genre you're looking at.
• Authors have an opportunity to disrupt the publishing industry as we move into this holiday season.

What if we promote audio and digital products?

Embracing the new normal.

Ebooks and audiobooks have advantages over physical books.

• You can increase the font size or change the playback speed
• An entire library can fit in your pocket
• Better for the planet
• No shipping required

What can we do to make giving an ebook or an audiobook more desirable?

If you want to give something tangible, think inside the box.

What if we create beautiful gift cards for ebooks and wrap them up? Ebooks are generally cheaper than printed books. We can give more books for the same price!

7 Ideas for Enhancing eBooks as Gifts

I polled several groups of authors that I know and we put together some ideas to increase the fun factor of egifts.

1. Put the download link into a QR code. Then work that QR code into the image on a pretty card, making the card interactive and fun. You can do this with a physical or electronic card.
2. Buy a book from a used book store and then put the digital gift code inside as a bookmark -—bonus points if you are giving a book in a series.
3. If your gift comes in the form of a code, create a puzzle that reveals the code: put the puzzle in a card. You can get as creative as you'd like with these, from crossword puzzles to quizzes from other books you know this author loves, or even teasers about the gift. Again, this could be a physical card or an email.
4. Put the gift code in a box of tea or other reader-friendly experience.
5. Give a gift that relates to the book, and attach the ebook code to it.
6. Attach the code to a picture of the book cover. Bonus points for framing the image or being creative in how you use the image.
7. Create an ultimate reader gift: a warm cozy blanket, mug with supplies for their favorite hot beverage, and a gift code for an ebook you know they'll love.

What about the dilemma around the different technologies that people use to buy their ebooks?

We don't have an easy way to guess what format our gift recipient needs. And yet we face this same dilemma when we give sweaters or jewelry — what size does the person wear? We've grown adept at guessing and being sneaky to figure out our loved one's size. Learning our friends' digital preferences can become part of the gift-giving adventure.

BookFunnel or similar tools may offer a solution

If we do know what type of technology our reader loves, we can give them a gift directly from their chosen venue. Not all, but most, ebook retailers offer the option to give an ebook as a gift to someone. They can email it directly to the recipient. Or, if you "give" it to yourself, you can get a code to give to the recipient to redeem.

One more advantage to ebooks, especially for indie authors.

Generally, a higher percentage of the profits from digital goods go to the authors. By making the move to giving digital gifts, we won't only be saving the planet, we'll be feeding the creatives, helping them to continue creating new and exciting stories for us to share with our loved ones.

What do you think? Who's with me in creating a digital gift-giving disruption this holiday season? Let's discuss in the comment section!

Links for more info:

• Where has all the paper gone?
• Global shortage of ethanol effecting solvents and printing inks
• New York Times: Good News, There's a Labor Shortage
• The shipping crisis is getting worse. Here's what that means for holiday shopping
• Mail Delivery Is About To Get Slower And Pricier Just In Time For The Holidays
• Supply Chain Challenges: Put Your Book Orders In Now For The Holidays
• The Features You Need to Build Your Indie Author Business
• Here's a tool to generate QR Codes

About Lisa

Lisa Norman's passion has been writing since she could hold a pencil. While that is a cliché, she is unique in that her first novel was written on gum wrappers. As a young woman, she learned to program and discovered she has a talent for helping people and computers learn to work together and play nice. When she's not playing with her daughter, writing, or designing for the web, she can be found wandering the local beaches.

Lisa writes as Deleyna Marr and is the owner of Deleyna's Dynamic Designs, a web development company focused on helping writers, and Heart Ally Books, an indie publishing firm. She teaches for Lawson Writer's Academy.

Upcoming Classes

• November: How To Write a Novel in Evernote
• December: It's a Wonderful Writer's Life
• January: Crazy-Easy Awesome Author Websites!

Top Photo by Ian Taylor on Unsplash