Some Writerly Advice for the New Year
December 28, 2022 by Alina K. Field in category Quarter Days by Alina K. Field tagged as New Year's Resolutions, writing
Have you made your New Year’s resolutions?
Christmas and Hanukkah have passed, and I hope your celebrations were happy. Now is the usual time to start thinking about resolutions for the New Year.
I haven’t made any, and don’t intend to. Last year I decided my only resolution would be to take baby steps into the future. I think that’s probably one of the few resolutions I’ve ever kept!
What I need, I suppose, is motivation!!! With that in mind, here are some words of wisdom from famous authors of the past:
- “The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul…” —Gilbert K. Chesterton
- “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” —George Eliot
- “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” — C.S. Lewis
- “Ring out the old, ring in the new, Ring, happy bells, across the snow; The year is going, let him go, Ring out the false, ring in the true.” —Alfred Lord Tennyson
- “It’s never too late to become who you want to be. I hope you live a life that you’re proud of, and if you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start over.” —F. Scott Fitzgerald
- “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” —E.E. Cummings
- “Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.” —William James
When you’re as old as I am, it’s always nice to hear that it’s never too late. But actually, I found this bit of advice more in tune with the author and the upcoming holiday:
“Too much of anything is bad, but too much Champagne is just right.” —F. Scott Fitzgerald
What’s your New Year’s resolution? Share it in the comments below.
You can find more suggestions for your New Year’s resolution prep at Parade.com.
Have a blessed and happy New Year, and I’ll see you back here in March for my next Quarter’s Day post.
Image credits: Depositphotos.com
Some of Alina’s Books
Finish Your Book This Year by Kitty Bucholtz
January 9, 2021 by Kitty Bucholtz in category It's Worth It by Kitty Bucholtz tagged as encouragement, finish your book, Kitty Bucholtz, New Year's Resolutions, Write Now Workshop Podcast
Happy New Year, friends!! I hope the first week of 2021 was a beautiful surprise, with more peace and more joy and more hope than you expected. (With one glaring exception, that’s how my week went.)
I emailed my list this week and encouraged them to believe that each of us can change the world with our books and writing. I shared what a nurse friend told me, that when she loses a patient all she wants when she comes home is to escape into a story with a happy ending. Now, more than ever, I want to be part of encouraging those with necessary and difficult jobs to keep going.
And I want to encourage you to keep writing stories that help people feel connected, stories that give them hope, or nonfiction books that help people where they need it. If you’ve been stuck in your writing, if 2020 seemed to have stolen your artistry or creativity, maybe my Finish Your Book one-to-one book coaching can help. Reach out to me (kitty at kittybucholtz dot com) and let’s talk. Finishing your book and getting it out into the world is a worthwhile use of your time this year!
You may know that I always have an Encouraging Words episode on my podcast on the first Sunday of every month. This month’s episode is a great boost to get 2021 on the road to being a great year. I hope it encourages you!
WHAT HAPPENED TO MY NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION. . .INTENTION. . .PROMISE. . .WHATEVER LIST?
January 5, 2016 by Tracy Reed in category Pink Pad by Tracy Reed tagged as BookBub, Edgy Christian Fiction, New Year's Resolutions, Tracy Reed
Happy New Year. I thought that title would capture your attention.
I ended 2015 on a high. YEAH!! Not to sound preachy, but my getting a BookBub ad, truly was a blessing from God. I was hoping to share the details, but the ad didn’t end until January first and I’m still sorting through the “tails” or results. I’m truly amazed at the effect a BookBub ad can have for an author. I hope to be able to share the details with you next month.
Back to that extremely long and strange title. I don’t make New Year’s Resolutions or Intention Lists or Promises. I tried to be diligent in creating a list, but failed to follow through beyond making the list. What does that say about me? I have my hands full with my daily To Do List. It’s funny, a vast majority of people spend the last week of the old year or the first week of the new year, scripting these elaborate lists. For those that are dedicated to this ritual and sticking to the lists, I say congratulations.
As it is, I’m wondering if I over shot the rainbow when I made my production schedule for 2016. We are only five days into the new year and I’m already starting to second guess my ability to complete the schedule.
See, I decided to finally be pragmatic and craft a detailed chart of my proposed titles for 2016. When I made the chart a few months ago, it seemed logical that I would be able to put a title out every month. What the crap was I thinking? And to make things worse, I scheduled January’s title to release two days before going out of town. I have been so tempted to push the release date, but if I do, my entire production schedule gets shattered. So, I “m going to muddle through and hope to stay on track.
In spite of me not having a sacred New Year’s Resolution List, there are a few things I hope to get accomplished this year.
- Get 7-8 hours of sleep a night.
- Grow my hair out about 3-4 inches
- Not freak out if I have to push something back on my To Do List or Production Schedule
That third thing on my list is huge and is full of innuendo and really only makes sense to me. Hey, it’s the first of the year and I’m allowed to be a little deep, strange or still high from sugar. Smile. Besides, I think my daily To Do List, would be a little jealous if it wasn’t the center of attention.
Since I don’t have a Resolution, Intention, Promise or Whatever List, I want to share something I read on Heather Clawson’s HabituallyChic.luxury blog.
It’s a list of 45 Life Lessons by Regina Brett, the New York Times bestselling author of God Never Blinks: 50 Lessons for Life’s Little Detours. I highlighted the ones I really like and might add to my DAILY To Do List.
45 Life Lessons:
- Life isn’t fair, but it’s still good.
- When in doubt, just take the next small step.
- Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.
- Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
- Pay off your credit cards every month.
- You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.
- Cry with someone. It’s more healing than crying alone.
- Save for retirement, starting with your first paycheck.
- When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
- Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up the present.
- It’s OK to let your children see you cry.
- Don’t compare your life to others’. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
- If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.
- Life is too short for long pity parties. Get busy living, or get busy dying.
- You can get through anything if you stay put in today.
- A writer writes. If you want to be a writer, write.
- It’s never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.
- When it comes to going after what you love in life, don’t take no for an answer.
- Burn the candles; use the nice sheets; wear the fancy lingerie. Don’t save it for a special occasion. Today is special.
- Over prepare, then go with the flow.
- Be eccentric now. Don’t wait for old age to wear purple.
- The most important sex organ is the brain.
- No one is in charge of your happiness except you.
- Frame every so-called disaster with these words: “In five years, will this matter?”
- Forgive everyone everything.
- What other people think of you is none of your business.
- Time heals almost everything. Give time time.
- However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
- Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.
- Believe in miracles.
- Whatever doesn’t kill you really does make you stronger.
- Growing old beats the alternative — dying young.
- Your children get only one childhood. Make it memorable.
- Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.
- If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.
- Don’t audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.
- Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.
- All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.
- Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
- The best is yet to come.
- No matter how you feel, get up, dress up, and show up.
- Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.
- If you don’t ask, you don’t get.
- Yield.
- Life isn’t tied with a bow, but it’s still a gift.
If I was going to make a New Year’s Resolution, Intention, Promise, Goal or Whatever list, it might look a little like this one.
Here’s hoping you plan your year wisely and don’t over shoot the rainbow, but shoot higher than you did last year.
Happy 2016!!!!!
Tracy
Tracy Reed
www.readtracyreed.com
Fiction for Women Who Love God, Couture and Cute Guys
New Year, New You, OCCRWA’s January 2015 Online Class
December 16, 2014 by A Slice of Orange in category Archives tagged as Laurie Schnebly Campbell, New Year's Resolutions, OCCRWA Online ClassWe could do that in April or October just as well. For that matter, we could do it today. So what’s the big deal about a new year?
Ask anyone who’s made some significant life change — getting married, choosing a new job, deciding to publish a novel — if they were inspired by a new page on the calendar, and chances are good they’ll say no.
Even so, most of us like the idea of making SOME kind of change as a new year begins. And for writers, it makes sense that the change is frequently related to what or why or how we write.
What do you write?
Do you still love it? Have you tried other kinds of writing? What would happen if you did? How did you choose what sort of writer you wanted to become?
Why do you write? What got you started? What does it DO for you — aside from making you elated and making you frustrated, depending on how the story’s doing? Why are you writing instead of, say, fly-fishing?
(For anybody who explains that it’s because their favorite fly-fishing stream is covered with ice in the winter, that’s a perfectly good explanation!)
Finally, how do you write?
Aside from being a plotter or pantser, do you have rituals? A love or a fear of deadlines? A preference for plot or character, setting or action, description or dialogue, process or product? A particular place or time you like to think up plot twists, interview characters, get your outline or paragraphs down on the page?
Some of what you’re doing right now, some of what you’ve been doing ever since you began writing, works beautifully for you.
Some of it, maybe not so much.
Which is where we get into the idea of New Year, New You.
If there’s anything you especially love about your writing, or if there’s anything that bothers you about your writing, here’s a good time & place to look at that.
The past seven times I’ve taught this class, last-day messages have ranged from “it’s such a relief to discover I’m not the only one who works that way” to “I never realized how much I needed this change” to “finally, I’ve discovered what I was missing!”
Everyone’s reaction is different. Some writers are inspired to switch genres. Some might decide to take up fly-fishing (although no one’s reported that yet). Others report a breakthrough, like those who’ve mentioned this class in their first-book acknowledgments.
If you have any questions on whether “New Year New You” can help with some issue in your writing life, let me know here or privately at Book Laurie Gmail Com — you can figure out where to email, right? — and I promise I’ll give you a straight answer.
Meanwhile, whether or not you use the upcoming new year to inspire any kind of changes in your life, here’s hoping you love the results!
New Year, New You
December 26, 2012 by A Slice of Orange in category Archives tagged as Laurie Schnebly Campbell, New Year's Resolutions, Online ClassAn OCCRWA Online Class with Laurie Schnebly Campbell
January 2 – January 29, 2013
COST: $20 for OCCRWA members, $30 for non-members
If you have specific questions, email occrwaonlineclass@yahoo.com
Enrollment Information at http://www.occrwa.org/onlineclassJan13.html
COST: $20 for OCCRWA members, $30 for non-members
Coming in February 2013
Plot Doctor: Fixing Your Story Problems
with Kara Lennox
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