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As promised in my last entry, here are some of my goals for 2006. I’m still working on the specific plan for achieving these, but I hope that by sharing my overall goals with you I will not only be more motivated to succeed, but that I will inspire you to take charge of your life and go after your dreams, be they personal or professional.

BIG GOALS
These are the large projects I’d like to tackle this year.

The Genre Traveler
Put out four issues (one has already gone out, three more to go!) and get content on a more manageable schedule.

DragonWyze Communications
Write a solid business and marketing plan for success. DragonWyze Communications is the umbrella company name for these four parts of my writing business: Carma’s Cookery, Non-fiction Writing, Fiction Writing and Speculative Fiction Projects.

Website Re-design
I’d like to improve the navigation of The Genre Traveler’s website, as well as make the DragonWyze website better reflective of my work.

MEDIUM GOALS
These are goals that fit within the above goals. Their success will lead to my success in the above goals.

The Genre Traveler
Produce one to two profitable tours for readers. The first one I’m working on is a trip to Toronto to see the Lord of the Rings musical* in the Spring, and the second is a Halloween party at a dude ranch in October. I’d also like to create a 2007 calendar that includes important event and convention dates, as well as representative art and photography for the genre traveler.

DragonWyze Communications
Carma’s Cookery — get the series of cookbooks back onto its original even-year schedule. For 2006, I’m working on “A Baker’s Dozen: A Memoir in 13 Cookies.” This would include 13 recipes for my favorite cookies with essays about how these cookies intersected with my life. I will also be practicing my food styling skills by taking photos for this booklet.

Also, I’d like to publish for sale, in both e-book and printed book format, all previous editions of Carma’s Cookery; and test about two pumpkin recipes a month and publish my experiences in my pumpkin blog at www.livejournal.com/users/dragonwyze.

Fiction Writing — complete “Wood for Og” and the re-write of “Hawaiian Time” so I can start submitting to magazines for publication.

I have other goals as well, but these are the biggies. So, have you written down your goals for 2006 yet? If you have, have you written out your plan for achieving them? If not, get to it! You only have a little more than two weeks of January left!

*You can read more about this musical in the October 2005 issue of The Genre Traveler at www.thegenretraveler.com.

I apologize for the lateness of this posting and for the lack of posting since Dec. 11. A stomach virus, the holidays and my crazy mad dash – still not over – to get The Genre Traveler out, has put my blogging on hold.

I believe that you can learn a lot about life from taking a look back once in a while. When it comes to goal making and keeping, it’s a good idea to look at the goals you made in the past and see how you did. This way you can learn how to make your goals for the future much more successful. For example, did you make too many goals for the year? Were you too ambitious for the amount of time you had? Did you not make enough goals? Were you too timid in your ambitions?

As an example of what I’m talking about here, I’ll go through the exercise of looking at what I posted as my goals for 2005. Due to my car accident in April, 2005 was not quite the year I’d hoped it would be. I wanted to:

• Clean out my online files. I started this project, but then got side tracked with more important and urgent projects.
• Digitize more of the paper in my office. I didn’t even start this project. Still want to, though.
• Complete my Travel Writing correspondence course. I almost made it. I read all the material and done most of the assignments. I just have one turn-in assignment to do and I’m done.
• Learn Spanish. Well, I learned enough to understand the gist of what people were saying when I went to Spain. Having dyslexia, languages are hard for me and I just didn’t have the time or motivation once I was hit by that van.
• Write and publish “Your Perfect Pie.” Done! My family members received a special edition for Christmas and I’m now working on getting it into e-book format for sale to everyone else!
• Take a couple of more writing classes. Oh, well, the thought was nice.
• Get a short story published for money. I had to put that one on hold for this year.
• Get some non-fiction articles published for money. Again, I had to put that one on hold for this year.
• Read, read and read some more. Well, made a small scratch in that one – long plane flights are a boon to your reading goals! I’ve completed all my subscriptions and have only renewed two, so I should be able to catch up this year.
• Be more regular with this blog. Well, in 2004 I had 12 postings, about once a month. In 2005, I posted 19 entries, almost twice a month. Mission accomplished!

What did I learn from this exercise? I’m way too ambitious. One of my goals in my 2006 goal planning is to be more realistic about what I can accomplish in my “spare” time. I’m a little behind on my planning for 2006, so I’ll post this year’s goals in the next entry. Then, next January, we’ll see if I have improved.

What about you? Did you write down your goals for 2005? Have you taken a moment to see how you did? No? Well, get going and write down your goals for 2006! It’s never too soon to start making progress in your life.