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January has slipped away (or almost, depending on your time zone). Are you on track with your writing goals? Have you totally given up on your new year’s resolutions? Do you feel as if you are totally underwater and swimming against the current?

By January 15^th, most new year resolutions are history. Don’t let this happen to you.

While working with a client today, I heard stress in her voice. She said that she was feeling overwhelmed about all that she had to get done. The more she talked, the more frantic her voice became and the more her sense of overwhelm came through.

I gave her a series of steps to help her break things up into manageable chunks and think about all of them at once.

Here are the steps I took her through.

• Sit back and take a deep breath. Flood her body with fresh oxygen
• Write down a list of the things she needed to do
• Prioritize the list into a logical order
• Spend 15 minutes on the first item in the list
• Sit quietly for 5 minutes
• Spend 15 minutes on the first item again or move to the second item, if the first one was completed.
• Continue on through the list in this manner

We can only focus on one thing at a time. If you are focusing on your overwhelming list, then none of the items will get your full attention.

Make a daily or weekly list of goals. WRITE THEM DOWN!

Keep your goals in a goal journal. You will always know where to find them.

Put a check mark or a gold star beside the ones you’ve completed. These simple things are very motivating.

When you are discouraged about not getting anything accomplished, you can look back and see that you did indeed accomplish your goals.

Share your goals journal with a friend. Have regular check-ins to keep you both on track.

Write Morning Pages as described by Julia Cameron. You’ll find that your list of things to do related to your writing will show up there. Transfer those to your goals journal.

Keep working on your daily or weekly writing goals . You’ll be surprised at how much you will accomplish.

Write on,

Lynn Jordan

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