Right-Sizing Your Writing Goals
How much is too much? And how to bring summer to a graceful conclusion
A Quick Note - The Fall Writing Circle is half full!
I’m so excited about running writing circles this fall! I’ve heard from a bunch of folks interested, and the circles are filling up fast. If you think you a writing/ feedback/ accountability group might be your thing, now is a great time to apply. If you’re interested in setting up additional editing and coaching beyond what’s offered in different tiers, we can absolutely create a custom package as well - just shoot me an email! If you have friends who will be on sabbatical, this is a great way to build accountability and structure into their schedule-please let them know!
Learning Hard Lessons about Barbecue
Despite living in Texas for nearly half of my life, I eat mostly vegetarian. Until last week, I’d never had the terror experience of ordering at a barbecue joint. But my childhood best friend was visiting Austin, she wanted Texas barbecue, so off we went in search of a place with great meat and indoor seating (we’ve been under an excessive heat warning here, and it’s not cute). So we get to the counter, where a buff dude with tattoos and a machete-like knife is waiting to hack off whatever we desire. Cyrus, my nine-year-old, asks if he can try beef ribs. When in Rome! Our dude asks how many ribs. Cyrus lifts his eyebrows at me—”two?” Two seems reasonable. Two tacos. Two pieces of pizza. Two ribs, right? Y’all. When I say they sawed off two ribs the size of his head…
…and then they handed me the bill for $77. Thirty-four dollars a rib! My heart stopped. As Taylor Swift reminds us, “you don’t know what you don’t know…” and that seems true in terms of how to right-size my barbecue order in Texas. Meanwhile, my friend joins us with a perfect slice of brisket and a little piece of turkey, looking much more human than cave person.
Right-sizing your Writing Goals
If the universe had gifted my husband with $77 of ribs, it would have been a near-holy experience for him. But for Cyrus, it was weird and kind of stressful. He ate about three bites, said he was full, and asked for ice cream. Lessons learned.
Similarly, there’s no right amount of writing you can get done this fall semester—the trick is figuring out what your sweet spot is, and then giving yourself wiggle room on either side. If you are prepping two new classes and have a newborn, you aren’t going to write a book this fall—it’s just not realistic, and so setting that goal is going to make everything seem fraught and stressful. At the same time, if you have sabbatical this year and aren’t setting sabbatical-sized goals for yourself, you’ll end up feeling like you under utilized your time.
If you’re still on summer-mode, bookmark this and come back and read it in a few weeks. But if you’re starting to peek ahead at August’s calendar, here are 3 things you can do to set yourself up for fall success.
Doing an Audit of Your Time
Before the semester starts and students start emailing you and meetings start popping up on your calendar, spend a few days backwards planning your semester (or year). I have some thoughts here about how to make yourself write every day. Here’s how to decide NOW how to do it. (Mirya Holman and Raul Pacheco-Vega also have great advice about how to micro and macro plan).
There are a number of things you can’t control - when you might get an R&R back, when kids get sick, etc - so building flexibility into a careful structure is the way to make sure you can adapt to changes as you need to, but not completely lose your way. Here’s one way:
Put in any hard dates - R&Rs, grant applications, conference application deadlines and think strategically about how conferences and workshops will support your writing goals. This means structuring your writing calendar for the year around those due dates, and then fitting other things in.
Write down all other immovable commitments. Faculty meetings (ugh). Teaching days. Chairing your monthly bowling club meeting. Soccer games your partner can’t attend. Your two-week trip to Spain over winter break. Standing meetings with co-authors. Daycare drop off and pick ups. Doctor’s appointments.
See what’s left. At this point in the planning process, look at your calendar and start blocking out your writing time—my suggestion is to find at least three two-hour blocks, every single week, that you do not let anything else get scheduled against (this means not being available for meetings or child pick up or grading then). Block those off.
Now, put in the “other stuff.” Office hours, the gym, lunch with your work friends. These are things that are important, but don’t get scheduled over your writing time.
Go back and schedule other, more flexible, times for writing (that can be moved if necessary).
Add up (by days/weeks/months/hours/whatever works) how much time you have for writing. If you like it, then move to the next step. If not, go back and reassess 1/2/4 so you can make more room.
Backwards Planning Projects Based on That Time
At this point, put aside your schedule and look at your pipeline. For each project, think through its timeline - what you want to accomplish by the end of the semester/year, what needs to happen in order to get that done. Rank the projects in terms of importance (however you define that - prestigious journals, co-authored works, a book you need off your desk and out of your life, etc), and then urgency (ol Stephen Covey never lets you down), and then map out your writing plan for the year. If you want to have a draft of your book done by May, how do you get there? If you want to have four articles out the door, are you moving each one along each month so that you can accomplish those goals?
This is the moment when you decide if ordering two ribs is the right amount of barbecue for you. If you start trying to map your writing goals on top of your writing time and the puzzle pieces don’t fit, it is probably a sign that you need to reevaluate your reach goals for the year. But if you only have enough work to get you through til January, then maybe it’s time to start adding work early in the pipeline.
After this, you have a blueprint (which you can evaluate weekly or monthly) of where you’re going, what you want to accomplish, and how long you think it’ll take you to get there.
What Support do You Need?
The last thing you need to do is identify the kind of support you’ll need to accomplish those goals, and start putting it into place now. If you’re going to do AcWriMo this year (I’ll run another free AcWriMo group in November-the past few years have been amazing!) then plan that into your syllabi and travel schedule. Don’t (like I did) decide to run a massive PTA pie sale while you’re re-writing your book, or you’ll lose your mind (like I did).
If you know you need your co-author to be on the same page as you, get weekly meetings on the books now.
If you know you’ll need errand running time in the afternoons so you don’t give up your writing time in the mornings, get your partner or babysitter to pick up kids now.
If you know you want to work with an editor in the spring, get on their books now (yes, really!)
If you know you’ll want to do a writing retreat (more on these soon), then apply for university funds for these now.
If you know that you’ll need some accountability to get things done, think about joining or forming a writing group (like my awesome fall writing circles!).
Planning those support structures now will mean that they’re in place not to catch you when things start going haywire, but to keep things from going a little less haywire to begin with.
I’m wishing you a very happy end of summer and transition to fall. If you need some extra support, you know where to find me!