The Fabulist Flash

Issue 68

2006 Wall Calendar

In This Issue:

1. This Week
2. Dream a Little Goal
3. How will you get to Grandmother's House?
4. Want More Goal Setting Advice?
5. About The Fabulist Flash

1. This Week

Happy New Year!

2005 has flown by and I find myself wondering, where has the year gone? How did we get to the end so quickly? I don't really understand the Time/Space Continuum, so I won't attempt to explain it. What I do know is that it's been an exciting year for me.

I've taken time over these last few weeks to reflect on the year that's passed. A few of my 2005 highlights: I've learned about queries and book proposals, sold, written and published my first book, learned the ins and outs of the publishing process, improved my writing technique, hired and fired an agent, entered into the world of publicity and promotion, grown comfortable with print and radio interviews, experienced my first television interview, and saw my book hit a bestseller list. I've also attended seminars, workshops, and conferences, meeting and learning from some of the best in the business.

As I continue to set new goals for 2006, my hope is that you've found these December goal setting issues helpful. For those of you who have said to yourself, can't we get back to information on writing, we're almost there. As I work on the 2006 editorial calendar, I can tell you that 2006 is going to be a fun and inspiring year here at The Fabulist Flash. The writer's guidelines are updated with current needs, so visit the site and check them out.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you, readers of The Fabulist Flash, for your continued interest and support. I've enjoyed sharing my journey with you. My wish for you is that your New Year is filled with happiness, love, and satisfying work. May all your dreams and goals come true.

For this final issue in the 2005 goal setting series, Diane Sonntag returns with Dream a Little Goal, I've shared some advice on achieving your goals in I've Got All These Goals, Now What? and, if you haven't gotten enough information on goal setting, there are links to a few more articles.

Until next week,

Gregory
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Gregory A. Kompes (www.kompes.com) is a writer, photographer, professional speaker and author of the bestseller 50 Fabulous Gay-Friendly Places to Live and The Endorsement Quest.

2. Dream a Little Goal

Dream a Little Goal
by Diane Sonntag

A lot of people wish they were writers. When I tell people that I write for a living, their response is often something like, "Oh, I would write if I only had more time." I usually just nod, but inside I think, "I don’t have any more free time than you do. You make time for what is important."

Having your writing published isn’t something that just happens. It takes a lot of work, and it isn’t always fun. If you say that you dream of being a writer, but you’re not writing on a regular basis, you’re just fooling yourself.

My children and I recently rented the kids’ movie, "Shark Boy and Lava Girl." My kids liked it because it was in 3-D. Although the plot was not the most engaging for an adult, I enjoyed the movie as well. The entire story revolves around a boy named Max who thinks he can control his reality through his dreams. He writes them down in a dream journal and then waits for them to come true in real life. But his friend Lava Girl tells him, "Most dreams don’t come true on their own. You have to work to make them come true. It’s not easy, but it’s not impossible either." Pretty good advice.

I don’t know very many writers who are exactly where they’d like to be in life. Most of us wish for bigger and better assignments. Those of us who are writing for contributor copies just want to be paid. Those of us who are writing for the web long to get into print. If we’re writing for regional publications, we want to break into the national glossies. Still others feel that you’re not a "real" writer unless you’ve written a book. The higher up the ladder you go, the taller the ladder seems to get.

Few of us have achieved everything we ever set out to do. Of course, if we had, what would be the point of writing? Of even of living?

Dreams are interesting though in that they change throughout our lives based on our experiences. Since I was a little girl, I’ve wanted to be a teacher. I majored in elementary education in college and found a job as a teacher. My dream had finally come true. But after eight years of teaching children with special needs, all I wanted was to stay home with my children. I longed to care for my own kids, rather than teaching other people’s kids all day. I left teaching with mixed emotions, acknowledging that I would miss it, but knowing that I was doing what was best for my family and myself. Along the way, I developed a new dream. I wanted to spend my days with my kids and write while they napped. While I haven’t yet made it onto the New York Times Bestseller’s List, I am writing and being published. I am working toward this new dream of mine.

It’s true that most dreams don’t just come true. It takes a lot of work to make it happen. The words "dreams" and "goals" should be used interchangeably. A goal is definitely something you work toward, not just something you hope and wish for. A dream should be the same way.

At the end of the movie, Max asks Lava Girl what he should do if his dreams don’t come true. She gives this inspiring answer: "You just dream a better dream and then work to make it happen."

About the Author
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Diane Sonntag is an elementary school teacher and freelance writer. Her work has appeared in print publications and on the web. She enjoys writing about parenting and family issues. She lives in Indianapolis with her husband and two young children. She can be reached at Rydeej@sbcglobal.net.

3. How will you get to Grandmother's House?

I've Got All These Goals, Now What?
by Gregory A. Kompes

Setting goals is the first step in achieving success. The goals themselves are useless if we don't achieve them and sadly the majority of goals and resolutions created fail to materialize. So, once you've got your list of goals what do you do with them?

Seeing is Believing

Fantasy in life is important. We spend most of our childhood in fantasy play. We pretend. We create imaginary worlds and interact in these worlds as if they're real. We play "what if" and "you be" games. Our freedom from judgment and self-censoring allows us to believe that we are what we imagine.

As we grow older, our minds change. We learn about truth and reality. We begin to understand that those childhood games aren't real and we stop playing them.

Yet, as adults, we continue to escape into stories, movies, books, and music, mediums that allow us to alter our present, at least for a few moments. This proves that we still have the fantasy play skills of childhood, even if they're a little rusty.

It's a long-standing belief in Eastern philosophies that visualizing goals, seeing ourselves being successful is the first step in achieving our goals. We have to believe we're capable of success to arrive at the destination. Seeing is believing doesn't only apply to our physical world, but to our mental world, too.

Several times a day, fantasize about achieving your goal. See yourself at the destination. Amazingly, you'll find yourself believing you can get there. That belief is the key to success.

The shortest distance between two points is a straight line, but taking in the scenery can be fun, too!

When you take a car trip you plan a route. You may choose the back roads and take in the scenery, or you may choose the highways to get there faster. Either way, you make a plan. Some travelers go it alone. They get the road maps and plan a route and take the trip. Others turn to someone else for help, like visiting MapQuest or requesting AAA TripTiks.

When we plan our trip, we also estimate a time of arrival (ETA). If we're going to grandmother's house for dinner, we know we have X number of miles to travel and grandmother always serves dinner at 6:00. A little math determines how long it will take to get from our home to grandmothers, but there are a few other possible considerations. Will there be snow in the woods that will require a little extra time? Will we stop on the way to pick up grandmothers favorite maple syrup from that little riverside stand? Do we want to arrive a little early to have time to show grandmother our vacation pictures?

Arriving at goal success is exactly the same. We need to plan our journey, decide if we'll go it alone or need help, and determine our ETA if we hope to arrive at our destination.

Will you go it alone or ask for help? If you've never set out to achieve a specific goal before you have some different options. One way is to figure out the journey on your own. This will make for an interesting personal adventure, but you'll need to be prepared for possible mistakes and setbacks as you learn your way through. Another option is to look for help. If someone else has done what you want to achieve turn to them for advice. Take a class, read a book, newsletter, or article, and study how they succeeded.

If your goal is to sell an article to Big Glossy Magazine (BGM) what are the steps? You need to come up with an idea, read BGM to understand their style, write a query letter, let that cool, rewrite the query letter, get envelopes and stamps, find the correct editor's name and address, print the query, sign the query, address your self-address-stamped envelope, print your additional clips, put the package together, mail the package, wait for the six week's later acceptance, research the article, interview experts, write the article, let it cool, rewrite and edit the article, send the article, wait for the article to be edited and published, wait for the check, deposit the check, do a happy dance because you're a published and paid author.

Goals and dreams can be as big as we want. Anything truly is possible. We just need to be realistic about the steps involved and time frame required to achieve our goal. If the trip to grandmother's house takes two hours, we'll never get there in 30 minutes. Likewise, if our goal is to be published in BGM in a month, but BGM doesn't even respond to queries for six weeks, we'll never achieve our goal.

What individual steps will it take to get from where you are today to where you hope to be when you achieve your goal? What's your time frame? Have you padded that enough to take in the scenery? Now, see yourself at the dinner table and plan your journey.

About the Author
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Gregory A. Kompes is a freelance writer living in Las Vegas. www.Kompes.com

4. Want More Goal Setting Advice?

Here are a few more goal setting articles if you still want more!

Are Your Goals Holding You Back?

How Dreams Become Goals

Goals Setting from About.com

Personal Goal Setting from The Time Management Guide

Goal Setting—Strategies for a Balanced Life

5. About The Fabulist Flash

ISSN: 1554-0804

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Make plans now to attend the 2006 Las Vegas Writer's Conference March 30-April 2, 2006, in Las Vegas, Nevada.