by Elizabeth S. Craig, @elizabethscraig

Over Christmas last year, I had a bit of a zoo in my house. My husband and I added a young cat to our household, bringing our total to three: two cats and a dog. My daughter came over to spend the holiday with us, which was wonderful. She brought her two cats with her. One of her cats was not pleased with our newest addition, so the two had to be separated.

Because I get up the earliest (4 or 5), I was the one who fed the animals their breakfast. Ordinarily, I have a routine with the animals before I settle right down to my writing. I let the dog out, feed everyone, refill water bowls, empty litter, put away anything that’s not in its place, and sit down to work. That’s what I considered a successful start to my day.

During Christmas, however, I had to completely refine success. If everyone ate his or her own food and there were no cat fights in the process, I felt as if I’d done well.

I think it’s a good idea to go easy on ourselves when at all possible. So often, we’re much kinder to others than we are to ourselves.

One example of being kinder to ourselves is to not set ourselves up for failure. That’s why I had to scale back my all-important routine over the holidays. I also gave myself a break with my word count then because I realized it was going to be tougher to churn out words when there were animals running over my lap and keyboard all the time.

It’s late-August. How are your goals for the year going? It’s good to take an honest look at what you planned to accomplish in 2024. Were you asking too much of yourself? Do you need to scale things back and make them more reasonable? When I had small children in the house, I always made sure my goal was 15 minutes a day. It felt good to meet my goal and gain confidence while establishing a routine.

This doesn’t only apply to writing, of course. Can you redefine success in other ways so you can feel good about your accomplishments? Instead of unreasonable goals for exercise or diet, for example, can you make some minor changes like doing stretches or core exercises when you watch TV? Or adding an additional fruit to your day?

I’m not saying we should give ourselves carte blanche to ignore all our goals. But it can be good to revisit them, modify them, and redefine success in a way that gives us the sensation that we’re progressing.

How do you set smarter goals for yourself? Have you ever had to redefine success?

Redefining Success as a Writer:
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Image by Sergio Cerrato – Italia from Pixabay

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