Tag: goals

The Inertia Paradox

I am into Finals Week in my day job here at Northwest Missouri State University. My schedule has already relaxed as I make it a point to get all my grading done before finals week, and my exams are multiple choice. For all intents and purposes, then, I’m done with the semester except for paperwork.

My summer will be much more flexible — I will supervise 20 interns, which will require visiting them, calling their supervisors at the beginning of the semester, and some grading, all of which can be scheduled at my discretion within reason.

I will have more time this summer. And it will make it harder to write. Does this seem like a paradox? Wouldn’t having more time make it easier to write?

As it turns out, having more time — or more specifically, less to do — makes it harder to write. We are all victims of inertia — a body at rest stays at rest. But inertia works both ways — a body in motion stays in motion.

During the school year, I am a body in motion — four classes, half a dozen interns, meetings, other committments. On a summer schedule, I have plenty of time to be at rest, with no timetable set for me. I can spend all day checking for readers on Blogger if I want. Therefore, I’m a body at rest, and without solid goals — more solid than I have in the school year — I will become a body at rest.

After this school year, which was one of the hardest I’ve had in a while, it would be welcome to rest. But not long enough that I become a body at rest.

Inertia

I haven’t written on my work in progress the past several days because of two things: The need to have my classes laid out and revised by the first day of college meetings (i.e. Wednesday), and the delightful distraction known as planning my summer garden.

I’m done with class prep, so it’s time to write again. However, I’m suffering from inertia of motion — it’s easier to continue what I have been doing (revising classes, planning the garden) than it is to change direction again and start to write. In other words, my mind is stuck.

How can I break inertia and start writing again? Marelisa (2004) suggests some inertia-busters:

  • Shock Myself into Action — Think of a goal I won’t meet if I don’t write.
  • Secure Short Term Wins to Overcome Inertia — Frame my goal as “spending four half-hour periods writing today”.
  • Dangle a Carrot In Front of Myself – Reward myself if I complete the task.
  • Fill My Gas Tank — Rest if I need to!
  • Use a Stick — Make myself do something unpleasant (like cleaning the litterbox) if I don’t complete the task.
  • Create a Clear Vision of What You’re Trying to Achieve — Some people have visionboards. This doesn’t work for me because I have trouble visualizing (imagine a very blurry image that lasts for about a second). But I can think of this as the relationship between my main character and others.
  • Stage It — Have all my writing things at hand, staring me in the face. In this case, it’s sitting in my most comfortable chair with my computer and computer desk.
So now I have goals based on these strategies to overcome inertia and push myself in another direction. Have you noticed my writing has been more technical and less poetic the past couple days? That’s inertia. I need a creative outlet to get my balance back. I need to write.

Marelisa (2004).  Seven Ways to Overcome Inertia and Get Yourself Unstuck. Available: https://daringtolivefully.com/overcome-inertia [Deember 31, 2017].

Goals vs. New Years Resolutions

I’ve taught enough about goal-setting over the years that I can write very solid goals. Goals should be:

  1. Specific
  2. Measurable
  3. Action-oriented
  4. Relevant 
  5. Time-oriented
So, for example, the goal “Send queries*” fails several of these parameters:

  1. Specific?  I don’t know which of my manuscripts I’m sending queries for, nor to whom.
  2. Measurable? Am I done with just one query? Seventy? Querying everyone in Query Tracker**?
  3. Action-oriented? I guess we’re okay here.
  4. Relevant? Is this the action that is relevant to acquiring an agent? Yes.
  5. Time-oriented: When do I need to have this done by?
The SMART (see what I did there?) version of this goal would be:
“Send 3 queries a day, targeting the agents on Query Tracker who handle science fiction, until I run out of agents.” There’s the goal, and I am on day 15 of that. I have thirteen days more of query writing this round. 

*****

I really like SMART goals, but I haven’t warmed up to New Year’s Resolutions.

First, resolutions aren’t goals. They’re not SMART. They’re sound bites that you have to provide to people when they ask:

“What’s your New Year’s Resolution?”
“I plan to marry Viggo Mortensen.”***

Second, there’s a concept in positive psychology called “ironic effects”, where doing something that requires self-control fails because we “know” we’re going to fail. For a good example, stare at a cheesecake you’re promised yourself you won’t eat.  I find setting resolutions a guarantee that I will give up on January 31. And why not? Resolutions set goals without setting up plans.

What else can I do if not resolutions?
Write down my SMART goals!
And tell everyone, “I don’t make resolutions.”

*****

* Queries are the submissions you send to agents and publishers to ask them to consider your work and potentially ask to read the whole novel. All queries start with a query letter, a special kind of cover letter. https://www.agentquery.com/writer_hq.aspx has good instructions for a query letter. Most ask for a synopsis of the book and some segment of the book (first three chapters, etc.)

**I use www.querytracker.com. Writers, you’ll thank me for this.

*** For my foreign (and domestic USA) folks who don’t know, Viggo Mortensen is an American actor. In the Lord of the Rings movies, he played Aragorn.  When I first saw the movie in 2001, almost 17 years ago, I joked about marrying Viggo Mortensen, as did about a million geek girls worldwide.