Happy New Year!

I love this time of year. The after Christmas part. It makes me feel energized. Well, truthfully, this year, we’re having people over for New Year’s Eve. So guests equal cleaning. That’s not a complaint, but you know how we get. Sorta omg, is everything just right? Again. Didn’t we just do that last week?

Right now I’m thinking about 2011, what I was able to accomplish, and what I wasn’t. One of the things I didn’t do was set hard and fast concrete goals. Especially for my writing. Thus I watched the days and weeks blow by while doing something else. Something that was just as important I’m sure, as keeping my dream alive.

Really? Where’s that little ‘I call bullshit’ icon when you need it. I’ve been reading a lot lately about how goals should just be generalized because we shouldn’t be too hard on ourselves. Well, there’s hard, and then there’s HARD.

Hard (meaning difficult, uncomfortable, or just what you really don’t want to do) is when you give up your favorite television show to write that fourth chapter whose beginning just escapes you because can’t figure out where to start it. Hard is when you get up early, or stay up late to write, because it’s necessary to your happy existence. Hard is when you spend your lunch hour writing, instead of going out for burgers or shopping.

And then there’s HARD. Really, truly, gut wrenching, life-changing HARD. HARD is when your spouse serves in the military, and you have to serve right along with them because they have a dangerous job, and you keep the home fires burning without them, every day. HARD is not having enough food to eat. HARD is losing a loved one. HARD is being homeless. Really homeless, like living on the street, or in your car.

See the difference?

I’m not really a resolutions kind of gal, but this coming year I will set goals. And the first one is not to whine about how ‘Hard’ my life is. I know people in all of those situations who’ve got it HARD. There are times when my life has been HARD. And I’m incredibly grateful that my life isn’t that way right now.

We’re all crazy busy most of the time. Yet we manage to make time for things that are important to us. And we’ll happily or maybe not so much, let the rest slide. I’m going to spend the weekend thinking about my concrete goals for 2012.

Once I get them on paper, I’ll let you know what they are. And you can follow along and see if I do better with concrete goals than rather nebulous ones. At this point I have to say that I truly do admire people who can use nebulous goals and be successful. That must be awesome. Truly. It just doesn’t work for me. Thankfully, we can always change our strategy.

It’s with that thought in mind, that I’ll raise a glass of bubbly over the weekend, and be thankful for all of my writing friends and fans, who inspire me to be a better person. I didn’t say a softer one, but truly, a better one.

Wishing each of you a Happy New Year. And may it be the best one ever!!