Goals

Last week the best writers' group in the world, Romance Writers Ink, presented a workshop by bestselling author Jaci Burton (http://www.jaciburton.com) on setting goals -- a monthly plan, an annual one, a five-year one.

(Best laugh on "That Seventies Show:" some dude asks Hyde where he expects to be in five years. "In prison," Hyde responds.)

Considering that my alter ego and I together have written sixty-freakin'-four books, neither of us is very good at goal-setting. Where do we expect to be in five years? Not in prison, is my best guess. Writing is supposed to be creative, right? Unstructured? Liberating?

Snort. Biggest eye-opener to me in my career: writing is a damn business. Okay, so it doesn't require a college degree or pantyhose or even leaving your bed. It's still every bit as much a business as accounting, lawyering, or anything else. There are contracts to negotiate, edits to compromise on, a product to improve, expenses to track, taxes to pay, ongoing education.

(Years ago, Robert taught at a school that was part of Fleet Aviation Special Operations training in California. Part of his first discussion with the students always ended with, "Learning will take place." Ditto here. A writer's life doesn't depend on it, but her career does.)

Anyway, back to the subject. Jaci convinced me that I needed to actually sit down and think about something beyond the deadline for the next book. How exactly was I going to get to that deadline? My usual MO: piddle around, work in the yard, play with the dogs, read, play way too many freakin' computer games, then write frantically in those last few weeks before the deadline, generally managing to rush the book off overnight one day late (for only a puny fifty-five buckeroos or so). Listening to Jaci, my eyes opened wide. There's a better way???

So after mulling it over for a while (translation: playing computer games until I damn near went blind), I sat down one morning last week and came up with a detailed list of the goals I want to achieve in the next five years and the even-more detailed monthly list of how I can do that. It looks so reasonable on paper. Nothing -- at least for the rest of 2007 -- requires writing more than twelve pages a day. Hell, I've written thirty-five-plus pages a day. I can handle twelve.

The question is: will I? I hope so. Working at it slow and steady sure sounds more appealing (and kinder to my hands) than the frantic last-minute frenzy The thing is, I operate well under pressure. Usually the best pages I write are those frenzy pages. But then I go brain-dead for a week or two or three, depending on how long the frenzy lasted. And once I get out of the habit of going to the office every day and writing, it's a long, painful process getting back into it.

But Jaci's plan makes sense. It sounds good. It might just kick my ass, and I may go running, cowering like a weenie in the corner until the deadline frenzy kicks in again. But I'm gonna give it my best shot.

Let's hope it doesn't shoot back. Rachel10:34 AM