It’s with excitement and anticipation that I await January 3, the beginning of ROW80. NaNoWriMo was such a drain on my time and energy that I vowed to never do it again. But ROW80 is much more reasonable for those of us who have a life that we can’t take time off from. (I don’t think my boss would approve.)
I have two goals for ROW80. The first goal is to write at least 500 words a day on a new novel. That would put me at 40,000 words at the end of ROW80. But I will probably write more. It’s better to set a goal you know you can achieve and do better than to set a goal you’re not sure about and fail. And if I miss a day, I can write 1,000 words the next day and catch up easily.
The second goal is to have the novel I’ve already written, Haunted Lake, edited and published at the mid point of ROW80, which would be 40 days. That’s reasonable, I think.
I can’t wait to see what everyone is is shooting for!
lauralynnelliott.com 
We have very similar goals. Aiming for something you know you can achieve is a good idea. I tend to get delusions of grandeur and think I’m going to be able to whip out 4 full-length novels in 2 months. 🙂
Hey, Stacey, I don’t know why I had to moderate your comment, unless you’re using a different address. Weird.
I used to work for Weight Watchers, and one of the big things was to make sure your goals were attainable and measurable. Kind of like what Kait said. :0)
I never get delusions of grandeur. LOL
Joining in as well and shooting for 500 words a day. Will probably do more most of the time but 500 doable. Good luck with the new novel.
Good luck to you, too, Robin. I think this is going to be fun!
Good luck to all of you. I don’t write myself but I do like to read everything you guys are writing. I’ve found a lot of new authors this year that I just love so keep writing more so I can feed my habit! 🙂
Your appetite for books is voracious! LOL
I’m glad you’re finding new authors. I am too. :0)
I know what you mean by NaNo being a drain. 🙂 It took me almost two weeks to recover from it. One of the things I love about ROW80 is seeing the grand total. A single strand may not seem like much, but when added to the other strands you end up with a beautiful tapestry. 🙂 Good luck with your ROW80 goals.
Hi Reena. One of the worst things about NaNo is the timing. It’s way too close to the holidays. And if I missed a day, I freaked out and then had to hustle to make up for it.
Good luck to you, too.
The timing wasn’t great for me either with NaNo. I was in the middle of an editing session. Of course, I was burnt out on editing so wasn’t making much progress. Eventually I said just do it… and a few days later I was working on a NaNo book.
And I totally agree the holiday month was a pain. I finished just before Thanksgiving, but don’t think I wrote anything after Turkey Day. Too busy and just wanted to relax after. Took the steam out of me. 🙂
Measurable goals are always important for anything like this. I’m shooting for an ambitious goal (1000 words a day, plus other things), but I figure if I coped with NaNoWriMo I’ll find a way to cope with this too 🙂
Jason, considering NaNo forced you to write an average of 1667 per day, 1000 words per day is not quite as stressful. Everyone has to decide the right goals for themselves. I picked 500 because I was sure I could do that and probably will do much more. Good luck!
You know what I’m shooting for. I have the first Jim Benjamin book to rewrite and I cannot wait for you and Arlene to get a look at it. I think it will be a much better book and have a different look and feel than before. I am looking forward to seeing how Memphis Connection does and then I’ll be sending you Kat’s Decision in a few weeks so you can start editing that one when you finish Around The Word in 80 Days. Good luck; can’t wait to read what you come up with.
Jon, are you going to do a major rewrite or just some tweaking on the Jim Benjamin story? You can send me Kat’s Decision whenever you want to. I may be able to do some editing on that after I finish editing Haunted Lake, while I’m writing the Gnome story for ROW80.
I like that you have two concrete and well planned goals. You’ve setup very well to meet them. Mine is similar to your 2nd one.
Cathryn, you have to do some planning and try your best to stick to those plans. For me, the editing is as important as the new writing right now because I want Haunted Lake to be out soon. And I think both goals are very reasonable.
My goal is 500 words a day. Even with that modest goal, I think I’ll probably lose some sleep over the next 80 days to get it done, but I look forward to the satisfaction of watching that upwards tick tick tick of the word count as the weeks pass. Good luck to everyone!
Now that I’ve decided to add exercise back to my life, I have even less time, so I figured 500 would be reasonable. No way do I want to be under pressure again like I was during NaNo. But I did finish two years in a row. But at a cost. This is better. I’m so glad Kait decided to do this.
Great goals.
I’m going for at least 500 words a day too. I didn’t want to scare myself with big numbers and I’ll feel really confident on the days it’s easy. 😉
The thing is, if you set smaller goals, then you feel so good when you do better! Tonight I wrote 491 words over my goal. :0) There’s so much less pressure.
Hi! Good luck with your goals. So true about NANO, while I loved participating, it was very draining. I was able to learn a great deal about my writing style though.
ROW80 seems to to fit in much smoother with my chaotic life, even allowing me to have some breathing room. My main goal is to get in an hour a day, with at least 650wrds. I hope to accomplish more during ROW80, but the set goals are something that I can definitely fit in.
Good luck with the editing Haunted Lake. I’m already interested, lol 🙂
Have a great day!
S
ROW80 is definitely a more reasonable challenge. I think we can do this with no problem. :0)