I hope you’re all doing well with your goals, whatever they are. I’ve fallen off a bit, so I intend to keep this short and sweet…but y’all know I love my words. So we’ll see what happens.

It’s appropriate, though, that the momentum has flagged. Like many of us, I have big energy around the shiny new things and set out, totally gung ho, with plans and the best intentions. And then life and the real world intervene, and it gets harder to sustain. Streaks get broken. Those unanswered questions now need answers and they’re not easily found. I fall down my beloved research rabbit holes.

I’ll do another post or several on research, which is one of my favorite things but also an absolute time suck if you let it become such. I am blessed/cursed with needing to know certain things in order to be able to write forward—in this case, how my MC would have felt getting into and then traveling in this car on her way to meet her soon-to-be fiance’s family for the first time. Sometimes I can throw a TK in and keep going; other times not so much.

Did you make your November writing (or revising) plan? Have you blocked out time on your calendar and told your friends and family that this time is non-negotiable? If you did, AWESOME! If you didn’t, get after it. There’s still time.

As promised, this week we’re going to take a look at a tried and true planning tool that I use in both my own writing and my coaching practice: the Blueprint for a Book.

One of the things that plagues most of us at some time or another is that we’re afraid we’re not sticking to the plan or meeting expectations. Every one of my clients has at some point apologized to me for not getting ‘enough’ done, not meeting a deadline, or for taking a break when they need it.

Commit to a writing practice, whatever that looks like for your life.

Very few of us have the luxury of devoting hours of time each day to writing. We have to fit it in amongst all our other obligations. We do it because we love it, because we have something to say that we want to share with the world, and because we feel like words and stories are important.

Project management-land has swallowed me up lately but fortunately I had a quick break in order to celebrate book things with my friend and fellow coach Samantha Skal at ThrillerFest in NYC.

I’ve been thinking a lot about project management lately. As you may know, I accidentally fell into PM work as part of my editorial job way back in the day and as it turns out, there are a lot more opportunities for project managers than there are for editors. Go figure!

When I first started my book coaching business, my mentor Jennie Nash encouraged me to lean into these skills as part of my coaching toolkit. I had left my full-time PM job in 2016, being totally burned out on the gig (despite loving the company I was working for). Even 4 years later, I wasn’t ready to dip my toes back into those waters, no matter how much it might have helped me.

Hi friends! It’s been a while hasn’t it? I went on a little vacation that in real life was a wonderful week but in weekly dispatch life has extended itself a wee bit. So it goes.

I think—I know—why I haven’t had much to say.

A couple of months ago, I found out that someone else has written a book about my protagonist. It’s going to be published next year to great fanfare (or so the press release claims). There is an Important Agent involved.

This was a gut punch. There were tears. My husband brought me wine. My coach and friends did their best to rally me. I asked for and received more wine.

Just to be clear, there is nothing hinky going on. I don’t think this other writer somehow ‘stole’ my idea. Except for an occasional suspect email scam, that isn’t really a thing.

In a certain way, it’s validation that my protagonist’s story is interesting and needs to be out in the world. And I wholeheartedly agree that, while our novels are based on the life of the same person, in reality they are two totally different books. She couldn’t write my version; I couldn’t write hers.

I confess, the idea behind this came from a writing class I took with the wonderful Michele Ferrari, and when she shared it with us, it hit me particularly hard (in a good way).

Very broadly, we probably consider our works-in-progress in one of two ways

As work, a project that we have committed ourselves to and are determined to see across the finish line because of that commitment

A hobby, a creative pastime, something that we’re doing for the joy of itMaybe it’s just me, but before Michele shared this idea, I had never thought about the fact that I was in a relationship with my novel. And like any relationship, there would be ups-and-downs. It would need to be cultivated, nurtured. I would love it, I would hate it.

Have you (or anyone you know) ever said this? “Yes, I’ve written (or am writing) a book, but I’m not a real writer.”

Bullshit. Friends, this makes me mad. If you have a writer friend who says this, please, gently and with compassion, tell them they are full of it. If you say, or even think this about yourself, please STOP.

I know I’m the one who is supposed to dispense advice around here, but I’d love to hear how you balance your writing time with all the other demands of life. Some weeks, despite my best planning and intentions, it just doesn’t come together.

As my friend and fellow book coach Terri Thayer has said to me, we do this by choice. We all sit down to write knowing that at times we’re torturing ourselves. I remind myself that I could be doing other things. And sometimes I choose to do those other things, and that is okay.

How goes it, writerly friends? Things around here have been, shall we say, tricky? Perhaps you’ll be able to relate.

In the not-so-distant past, I came at you with advice on how to create and stick to a plan to make it to your next writing milestone. I shared how I structured my own plan to make it through my final major revision.

And then I hit a wall.

What happened? As is usually the case, it wasn’t one specific thing, it was several.

I am a firm believer in what I tell my clients about writing a novel: It takes as long as it takes, and you’re on nobody’s schedule but your own.

That said, I’ve been living with my protagonist and her adventures for more than 6 years now, and I’m ready to let her set sail. (Haha, she’s a pirate–see what I did there? Okay, sorry.) I spent most of last year’s creative energy rediscovering my ‘why’ and iterating on my Inside Outline. It’s time to re-start and revise.

Whether you’re germinating a new idea or revising for the nth time, there are some concrete steps that you can take to solidify your commitment to your creative self and your novel.