Dreams, Goals, and a Gift

Dreams, Goals, and a Gift
Terry Odell

This is my last official post of 2020, but the official TKZ Winter Hiatus doesn’t start until December 21st, so don’t stop visiting.

Is it too early to think about the New Year? Are you already thinking about the tradition of making resolutions? With a new year come new beginnings. Fresh starts. We all enter a new year filled with hope and promises to make it better than the last one.

And, usually, by the end of January, all those good intentions have gone by the wayside. I gave up making resolutions long ago (although I occasionally make them for the Hubster—less chance of me breaking them that way). What I’ve learned, is that if you want to see success, you have to narrow your focus.

These resolutions don’t work:

  • I resolve to be a best-selling author.
  • I resolve to write three novels this year.
  • I resolve to make $100,000 selling my e-books.

Why don’t they work? They’re dreams.

Dreams are wonderful. Dreams are things you’d love to have, but they’re also things over which you have no control, because they depend on other people. You need goals.
Goals have to be measurable. I learned that way back in college when I was getting my teacher certification. The course was “Behavioral Objectives” and we learned to set ways to measure whether we were getting through to our students. We could set a goal that at least 90% of our students would score at least 80% or better on an exam. This was a measurable outcome. If they didn’t, we’d have to go back and figure out why. And, frankly, the usual answer would be “because I didn’t teach the material effectively”, NOT “the students were lazy slackers.”

Another thing I learned in that course was that you had to take small steps. You had to figure out what skills were required for a student to answer a question on that exam correctly, and then work on practicing those skills. (Not teaching to the test—teaching skills.)

How do you turn those dreams into goals? Break them down into things you can do in small increments, and that you can measure. Being a best-selling author isn’t measurable. (Can I call myself a best-selling author if I pay for an ad and my books hit the number 1 slot on a very small niche at Amazon for a week? Some authors do, but that’s not something I’m comfortable with.)

Those who say, “I’m going to write three books this year” are likely to fail if that’s as far as they go. What does it take to finish the book? You take that lofty goal, break it into small pieces, and then figure out what you can do to achieve each piece.

Write X words/pages a day/week until you’re done. That’s something you can track. You can see your success. You have a specific goal each day/week.

And, most importantly, you can reassess and adjust these goals over the course of the year. Are you making your word count goal by 10 AM? Maybe it’s too low. Are you staying up until 3 AM and still failing? Don’t be afraid to lower it. Of course, you’ll want to take a hard look at why you’re not meeting your word count goals. If it’s because you’re spending 8 hours a day on Facebook, you might want to cut back on your social media time!

As for making $100,000? That’s a dream that depends on others. You have no control over who buys your books. You can develop a marketing plan, a budget, hire a publicist, but the sales are out of your hands. The one thing you can do, however, is to use the best marketing tool out there. Write the next book!

Whatever you’re looking for in the new year, I wish you the best in attaining it.

(Did you forget about the word “Gift” in the title? If you’ve read this far, I’ve got one for you.)

TP MenorahTomorrow is the first night of Hanukkah, which is the winter holiday my family celebrates, although there’s likely to be a different slant on the retelling of the “miracle” this year.

Because I consider everyone at TKZ, on both sides of the site, my family, I thought I’d offer you a gift as my last TKZ offering of 2020.

Deadly Production by Terry OdellMy gift to you: Enjoy a free download of Deadly Production, Book 4 in my Mapleton Mystery series. You can find your gift at Book Funnel. You can download an epub, mobi, or PDF file. If you have trouble, the wonderful folks at BookFunnel will be happy to help. (Download deadline is December 18th.)

Have a wonderful and safe holiday season.


Heather's ChaseMy new Mystery Romance, Heather’s Chase, is available at most e-book channels. and and in print from Amazon.

Terry Odell is an award-winning author of Mystery and Romantic Suspense, although she prefers to think of them all as “Mysteries with Relationships.” Follow her on Facebook and Twitter.