Welcome to the Serious Writers’ Accountability Group!
Post your goals for this month and let us know how you got on with last month’s goals.
Leave a comment below telling us how you got on last month, and what you plan to do next month, then check back in on the first of each month, to see how everyone’s doing.
(It doesn’t have to be fiction. Feel free to use this group to push you in whatever creative direction you need.)
Did you live up to your commitment from last month? Don’t remember what you promised to do? Check out the comments from last month.
And don’t forget to celebrate with/encourage your fellow SWAGr-ers on their progress!
Download your SWAGr Tracking Sheet now, to keep track of your commitments this month
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Examples of Goals Set By SWAGr-ers in previous months
- Finish first draft of story and write 3 articles for my school paper. – Courtney
- Write on seven days this month – Clare
- Extend my reading and to read with a ‘writers eye’- Wendy
- write 10,000 words – Mary Lou
So, what will you accomplish this month? Leave your comment below (use the drop-down option to subscribe to the comments and receive lovely, encouraging notifications from fellow StADa SWAGr-ers!)
(Next check-in, 1st of the month. Tell your friends!)
Hi Julia!
My “Story a Day in May” wasn’t completely met. But I am well on my way to achieving it and best of all, I made great PROGRESS. I wrote 16 full-length short stories, 15 flash fiction stories, and 3 poems. That gives me a total of 35, 684 words for the month of May! During that month, I also had a poem submitted and another poem published.
Thanks for your support! On to June’s project!!
Wow! I’d definitely call that a win!
Wow! 16 full-length and 15 flash stories?! I’m SO impressed.
And like you say, it’s all about the progress.
Congrats on that poetry publication too. You’re doing it!
My goals for May:
– Start a draft every day from the Story a Day prompts
– Finish the story that I have in progress
So far, I have an interesting sketch for May 1 that pleases me.
Today’s prompt (2 May, Hallie Ephron) got me writing a short story I never otherwise would have tried. It is short, a bit of a mystery and reflects the pandemic. And pretty much finished, I think. So, I’m pleased.
Thanks, Julie!
My goals for May are:
1 – Complete the outline for my first novel
2 – Continue research and start the outline for my current TV pilot
(I’m enrolled in a ‘concept to outline’ online course to facilitate these two goals)
3 – Write 4 short-short stories based on Sty-A-Day prompts
Love these goals!
I’ve dabbled at writing for years. Like everyone else, now has never been the right time. Always lots of story ideas, but I struggle to shrink them down to size and get them told. That is my goal for May and what drew me to the website. I’m hoping to take stories from idea to written in 2 hours or less, daily. The first writing prompt was amazing fun, but over 3,000 words later, I failed to meet my goal. Fortunately, the month is just beginning.
My goals for May will be mostly to try and create a momentum, and hopefully I’ll be able to increase my goals next month.
1. Complete the StoryaDay challenge;
2. Finish the outline for my novel;
3. Start posting more regularly on my blog.
Today is the beginning of my participation in the workshop and I am working on a short story. I am amazed at the benefit I am receiving from the writing prompts. Today’s piece swept some cobwebs away and put me to thinking about the interior of my main character. As a consequence, I changed the gender from a she to a he and a whole path developed that to two new characters. Not bad for an afternoon’s work in my case.
Nice!
I will write at least 1,000 words each day in response to the prompt (hopefully, more than that most days so I can complete a story.)
1,200 today 🙂
May is:
4 short stories or more.
3 more weekly memoir class assignments – 1 posted assignment per week for feedback, plus other free-writing tasks associated with it.
Memoir work as per my new (editable) outline.
2 – 3 blog posts a week, maybe a mixture of the rest of the list.
A close reading of 3 books on my course reading list, and one a week fiction.
Last month, I had about 7 goals. I completed 3 of them, and did much better on the others because of looking at them each day when I wrote in my planner.
This month, I’m going to set 3 goals for writing–one for each type of writing I’m doing now that my freelance writing job got canceled. I have more time to do the kind of writing I want now!
1. One story outline a day and write the whole story at least once a week. But good outlines I can go back to and turn into stories. Know the beginning, middle, and end.
2. Journal daily
3. Respond to all letters within 2 weeks of receipt
My goals for May 2020:
1. Write a story every day based on the prompts.
2. Send out a story every day–somewhere!
3. Practice piano every day for at least 30 minutes.
4. Practice fiddle every day for at least 30 minutes.
5. Get my first short-story collection ready for publication.
I also play piano – my lessons presently on hold due to some sort of thing happening all over that makes me a little leery riding public transit. I didn’t have that as part of my goals for SWaGr as piano was part of my all round “while under basic quarantine environment” goal.
I’m a virgin SaDMer and so glad to be here. I haven’t written a word for an entire month 😨 due to the global sitch and my chronic illness colliding and satanic pus pouring out from where my brain was.
So to say this challenge has come at a good time for me is an understatement. I’m keeping it simple: show up every day and finish *something*, whether it’s a story, or its skeleton, or a scene I can flesh out later. That’s enough of the elephant to bite off for now.
Toodleoo the noo.
Goals:
– Complete each day of Story a Day with either a plot outline or writing practice.
– Work on artwork (draw/color) for at least 15 min each day.
– Keep submitting one of my completed stories to magazines.
Thanks for organizing this! Really enjoyed the first day’s prompt and excited to have a way to push me to practice writing.
My targets this month include:
– Write at least one short story daily. Revise at least one story and submit it for publication.
– Read at least four books. Read at least one of the books critically: examine plot, pacing, setting, and characterization.
– Write, at a minimum, one blog entry daily
– Exercise daily to keep a healthy, flexible mind
– Attend one or more StoryADay Zoom meetups per week
Reflection
• I submitted three poems for publication in April. I’ve gotten three rejections, but I’ll keep submitting.
• I wrote a drabble and entered it into a contest, but I didn’t place. Oh well! It feels good that I participated.
• I started working on a chronological timeline for the novel I’m working on. I’m hoping this will help me feel more confident and decisive about what I need to research.
May 2020 Goals
• My goal is to write a drabble a day every day in the month of May. Hey! I accidentally wrote a poem.
Last month, I was supposed to write every day, complete 25,000 words on a Camp Nano Novel, and finish a first draft of a short story I started the previous month [3,000-4,000 words].
I wrote every day except two. But the two days I missed were nonconsecutive which is good because if I miss two days in a row, everything seems to fall behind. I did finish the first draft of the story (to be revised, if not this month, next month.)
Camp Nano: ended up with 8800 words instead of 25,000. However, I’m not going to let it bother me. The last two times I did Nano, I stopped early and quit writing. But I like this novel so I will keep writing it.
Goals this month:
1. Write a story every day
2. Continue to make progress on my novel (at least add another 2,000 words to the novel)
Hi, all!
Last month, my goal was to finish my Camp Nano project (at least the first 50 000 word half or the whole thing). I finished the full 100k word first draft, so I’m pretty pleased with that. Needless to say, I did nothing else writing-wise.
This month I plan to:
*write a story every day
*rewrite my cover letter & resubmit my novel
*figure out what to do with a few longer stories that have been kicking around for a while
Take care, everyone.
My May Goals are:
1. Show up to write for Story A Day, everyday, whether I “feel” like it or not, at sprints, or on my own, or both.
2. Continue editing my 1st draft novel.
3. Continue rereading/proofing another novel that I want to keep writing but have put down too long and lost the thread (of) .
My goals for May are:
1. write at least 30 stories for Storyaday.
2. write every day
3. submit three pieces
4. Make a list of publications to submit to from Pushcart Prize book
Considering that we are still in a state of emergency and not likely to get back to the office proper in May now…
Goal for this month is simply to participate in the StoryADay challenge for May
Bonus: get the gift story written for a fanfiction gift exchange I had signed up for in February and had to default on.
Omg, I love fanfic exchanges, which one were you working on?
I had defaulted on the Chocolate Box exchange in February. Basically this one is supposed to be one of the easier ones where you only have to write 300 word minimum fanfic or draw fan created art that is *not* on lined (assuming also not on graphed) paper. I cannot draw to save my life. My first attempt on a Little Women one made the minimum word count but the other caveat is that it had to be a complete story…
So now with the pandemic state of emergency thing happening, I decided I will see if I can actually get one written.
Or maybe I’ll end up doing stories featuring two characters I had created for a couple of Stardew Valley fanfics (maybe bringing them outside the fanfiction realm???)
Ooh, nice! I love Chocolate Box. I didn’t do it this year because I think I had another one happening at the same time.
Hope it works out for you and you can get it done. I believe in you!
My goal is to write for 40 minutes 5 days a week. I’m not setting up any criteria for quality or length or grammar or anything. To achieve this goal, all I have to do is write for 40 minutes.
Yay! Story a day in May!
Also, I want to rework on short piece to submit by the end of the month.
My goal for this month is to get into the habit of writing regularly. I want to settle into using all the Superstar resources and find out what works for me in terms of a writing day.
Hey there! This is my first post.
My goals for this month
Write a story a day.
Finish my writing course…6 modules left!
Make headway with my online Calligraphy course.
Write words for my book 2 WIP
Great goals! Which writing course are you doing?
I’m so sorry, I didn’t realise you asked a question!
I did the Write Fiction Course online.
I met all my goals for April, except entering two competitions. I failed to do that.
GOALS FOR MAY
Enter two short story competitions
Write a story a day with Julie.
Finish typing up and editing the pieces I’ve written for my novel so far.
Hopefully redraft some of them for a third time.
Yeah! I actually achieved every goal I set for May. I can’t believe how much I accomplished. Storyadaymay is a great motivator and I’m sure that it kept me focussed on my writing in general. Thank you so much Julie.
Fantastic! So pleased for you!
I want to write daily and build a writing schedule that doesn’t feel like I’m trying to make time for writing. I want it to become a part of my daily life 🙂
Woo! It’s (gonna be) May! In like, one hour. I’m so pumped!
Goal 1: Actually work on my novel omg
Goal 2: Story a Day. Every day.
Goal 3: Drop out of something, for Pete’s sake.
Goal 4: ???
Goal 5: Profit.
If I get the first two done, I’m riding high.
Write 25-30K words by the end of May. Show up every day!!
Participate seriously in the StoryaDay May challenge, and manage to complete a short story each day!