Monthly Archives: December 2016

Another One Bites the Dust!

Another ROW 80 Round, that is…  Yesterday I was too busy recovering from staying up all night on Wednesday, the Winter Solstice, to post anything coherent. We hold a vigil all night, keeping the bonfire burning from sunset until sunrise when we greet the sun’s return. We hosted about 60 people this year at our annual Winter Solstice gathering! Though only a handful of us stayed up all night.

Now we’re settling into the final preparations for our family Christmas celebrations. I have about 95 percent of my gift wrapping done, which is very cool. I find it’s easier to do the holiday thing now that the kids are older. Tonight we watched White Christmas. I’m feeling quite merry, and glad that most of the busy part of the preparations is done.

Here are my goals for this Round and the results I’ve had with checking them off:

2016 ROW 80 Round 4 Goals

Finish and publish Heart of the Goddess book. Work on it daily (on weekdays). Finish the first draft (target of 120,000 words) by mid-October (I’m starting the Round at 101K words already written). Do first edit. Send manuscript to advance readers. Do copy edits and get ready for formatting process. Write marketing copy. DONE! I’m really happy with how the book came out, and I’m setting up plans for promoting it throughout 2017. 

Re-read draft of Patterns in the Void and make revision notes. Make a plan for writing the revisions during Round 1 of 2017. DONE! I’ve drafted a plan and I’m ready to do this thing. The tentative plan is to publish it in July.

Continue my craft, finance, & business learning. Participate in In Arms Coaching fall program. Read at least 3 books about writing craft and/or making a living as a writer. Participate in Personal Finance Consciousness Circle (PFCC). Finish reading and working through the Barbara Stanny and Denise Duffield-Thomas books. I’ve been working on most of this. I love my coaching program, and the PFCC. I haven’t been reading as many craft or prosperity books as I would have liked, but winter is here and I’m sure I’ll have more time to cozy up with some good tomes.

Build community for Feline Dreamers. Create and promote monthly online workshops. Create new low-cost offerings. Complete 5th video for Love Alike website. Write sermon for UU service. This is going very well indeed. I haven’t yet written the sermon, but I have been thinking about it. We finally filmed that pesky 5th video, yay! All else is going smoothly.

Focus on blogging. Post to my Starcat’s Corner blog at least once per week, Feline Dreamers each month, and on this blog twice per week. Write, edit, and submit monthly guest blog posts for Kind Over Matter. Submit a guest blog proposal to Mike Dooley’s site. Start and keep a running list of blog post ideas, drafts, and picture ideas. It’s going okay. Being super busy hasn’t helped me keep up with as much personal blogging as I’d like, but I’m keeping my hand in. I do want to write that Mike Dooley post soon! I signed up for another year of guest posting on Kind Over Matter – I love them. 

Prepare for the winter holidays. Budget for and purchase gifts. Make cards. Plan for Thanksgiving, Winter Solstice, and Christmas gatherings. Finish punch list from last year’s home decorating project. De-clutter the basement. DONE – with the exception of the punch list and the basement. I’ve made progress on both of those items, but there’s still more to be done, so I’ll continue them into the next Round.

Enhance my physical health. Devote time to daily exercise, including but not limited to walking, yoga, dancing, hula-hooping, and swimming. Stop eating sugar. Eat less in general. This one is up and down. I have some plans to do better with this goal in 2017. Overall, though, I’m blessed with good physical health, for which I’m very thankful. 

Live AUTHENTICally and spiritually in my daily life. Do things I love: write in my journal, read, do yoga, dance, spend time with loved ones, and express my gratitude. Pay attention to my dreams and keep records of them. Set intentions before sleep and upon waking. Meditate and do my chakra clearing daily. DONE – yet never really finished. 2016 was a hard year in many ways, but in others it’s been amazing. I love that I’ve been meditating and clearing my chakras every day, all year. Wow. It really makes a difference in feeling good on a regular basis.

Okay, lovely people. I’ll see you in the next Round. Happy Holidays to you!!!

2 Comments

Filed under ROW 80

The Planned and The Unplanned

hotgbookcoverWhen last I wrote here, I was waiting for the proof copy of The Heart of the Goddess: A Handbook for Soulful Living to arrive in the mail. Arrive it did, and it looks great. So, my fourth book is hereby published and available in paperback and as an e-book! I’m beyond thrilled about that. I know some of you fellow ROW 80 writers are interested in the topic matter, so please check it out here if you’re drawn to do so.

On Thursday evening I came down with a bad cold, which I think is my body’s way of telling me to slow down and relax. Luckily I didn’t have a super full weekend planned, so I’ve been doing just that. Sipping tea, gazing at the lovely Christmas tree, and perusing some magazines. I also finished re-reading my novel draft, Patterns In the Void. I actually like it much more than I remembered (I wrote it during NaNoWriMo in 2014). I’m going to enjoy revising it during Round 1, and getting it ready for publication this coming summer. My next (and final, for this Round) task regarding Patterns is to make a revision plan.

My biz coach has also been emphasizing the importance of taking time off around the holidays, something we entrepreneur types can have trouble doing. It sounds good in theory, but we have a new book to promote, and workshops and an online class coming up in January. We need to keep our momentum. BlackLion came up with the idea of using technology to schedule all our biz blog posts, emails, and Facebook promos through the end of the year in advance. We don’t usually automate much, as we like to keep things real and in the moment. But in this case, it will give us some much-needed time off, and we’ll still be around to deal with replies and queries, it’ll just take less of our time. I love the idea, and that’s what we’ll be doing this coming week – finalizing all of our content and scheduling things out.

So, here’s what’s on the docket for this week, which is in practice the end of the Round for me, since I’ll be taking time off after that.

  • update all content for promoting The Heart of the Goddess, our Self-Worth Tune-Up free online workshop, and the Alchemy of Core Beliefs online course
  • finish book promotion plan and schedule the associated tasks and promos
  • schedule all promotional content out through the end of the month (and thus the end of 2016!)
  • make a revision plan for Patterns In the Void, to be implemented starting in Round 1
  • continue with holiday plans and preparations

Oh, and finishing healing from this cold, of course. I hope you have a delightful week full of creativity, prosperity, and joy!

2 Comments

Filed under ROW 80

Waiting for the Mail

As I write this, the proof of my book The Heart of the Goddess: A Handbook for Soulful Living is making its way to me. I can hardly wait! I love this part – when you get to hold the book you created in your hands for the first time. Eep! So excited!

Looking at my mini-goals list from last week, I’ve been making excellent progress. I’ve started my promotion plan for the book (my least favorite part of being an author, I confess). If anyone has a good book promotion checklist or template that they’re willing to share, I would very much appreciate it! I also worked on copy for our upcoming workshop and online course. Our free virtual event, Soulfulness Week, went pretty well. We had quite a bit of engagement, with folks commenting in the Facebook group and watching the videos. No one attended the live online workshop component on Thursday, but we did it anyway, and recorded it. I don’t know if anyone has listened to it yet. I’ve been keeping up fairly well with blogging, which I often neglect during this time of year.

We’ve been making our holiday plans, including the budget and timeline. I’ve also been making great progress on crafting holiday cards. We had a fun time today at my Mom’s house, making cards together.

I’m 30 percent of the way through re-reading my novel draft, Patterns In the Void, and making revision notes. That feels really good! I haven’t read it for a long time, and it’s actually better than I thought. It will still need significant revisions, but it’s a solid story.

Here are my mini-goals for the upcoming week:

  • Finish creating the book promotion plan and make a timeline for getting things done.
  • Continue to read Patterns In the Void and make revision notes.
  • Figure out some new ways to publicize our upcoming workshop and course, coming up in January.
  • Continue my holiday preparations.

Hope your week is full of all good things, including an extra dose of inspiration!

Leave a Comment

Filed under ROW 80