Hello there. Remember this post back in December? The one where I had to redo my December goals? Here’s the audio to that. Though the cast talks a bit about past events, it has a message about self-imposed tyranny I think we could benefit from.
Give a listen, drop a comment, and I’ll be chatting with you next week! Cheers!
(And apologies for the audio quality – this was the lost audio which was also done without a pop filter. 🤷🏻♂️)
(Featured image of chains and devices from Pexels.com.)
In January, I aim to keep a bit of that pleasurable heat, siphoning off some of it for means of production that contribute to my Financial Independence goals.
To do that, I have not really concrete goals, per say, but a schedule to follow for the month of January.
My Goals Due EOM:
Write
14 hours a week. Want to finish a novel by March, which has 336 hours set aside for goals. 14 or more hours a week gets me to the 160 to 226 hours necessary to finish the Shallow Seas first draft.
Housing
7 hours per week. Never thought I’d own a home, but it’s the third most lucrative decision (retroactively) behind working a day job and endeavoring to monetize my writing.
Private
2-3 hours a week will hopefully let me check a lot of boxes in my life. I may or may not tell you more, and more time may be allocated to this from other goals… Just know where my attention is and know it’ll be of objective benefit 😊
Leisure
3.5 hours to 7 hours a week of games! Making games! Movies! Travel! These things must be planned for as they’ve slipped off the radar, though not necessarily for decent reasons.
I’ve a shortlist of games and game designs to work on, as well as places to travel to in 2020. Whatever else gets added or removed, adding frivolous recoup time is my last goal for the month.
Am I too far off here? A lot of calculation has been done over the returns of these goals, all efforts feeding into my arch-goal of Financial Independence.
Let me know in comment what I’ve missed or misjudged. I value your perspective – you protect my blind spots! (You may notice podcasting is absent – that’s intentional. I’ll keep the casts up, though they will not be an excuse to skip out on higher-return efforts 😉)
Anyway, have a lovely month. I trust you are starting the decade off just right ~
Welcome to the new year, folks! The new decade! This was supposed to make it out in 2019 – with travel, work, and festivities, I forgot to post this article.
Oh well.
Anyway! Listen to some questions I have over approaching the twenties. I’m feeling especially confident right now, much more so than in the podcast. Give it a listen, and let me know what you’re aiming to do in 2020.
December heralded the end of not just a tough year, but a decade.
Many things happened, including a few goals. I’m very comfortable in what all occurred because I have a mind of what’s required in 2020. (More on that later.)
Regardless, we do need to review what got done and what I let slip:
Podcast
Failed. I had podcasts ready for every Friday in December. However, between technical failures and my own forgetfulness to schedule their release, only 50% of the casts made it out in time.
Into the future, I want to be more regular, though podcasting will fall from the position of priority it’s enjoyed for the last two months.
Abridged TTRPG Modules
Winning. I wrote an article on scaling back my game designs. Guess what I didn’t do? 😅
I have multiple tabletop roleplaying games being polished right now. I’ll see about providing a sample soon for your potential play. Sound good?
Shallow Seas 10K Words
Failed. I did not make it. However, Shallow Seas and other stories will be top priorities in the next decade.
Celebrate EOY
Won! My end-of-year letter is written, I had loads of fun, and a smidgen of time was spent with some very important people in my life.
50%-ish success rate. Pretty bad, especially considering I backed off a bit. For December though, I don’t much care. Analyzing my 2019 and peering into the future, I’ve found more important things to concern myself about. Writing, property, financial milestones… I look forward to sharing not just January’s but 2020’s goals with you in a bit!
Parties and seeing friends and remembering the year – check!
Podcasting? Hopefully. I’ve really borked Audacity – by the time you read this post, I’ll have decided on my own what to do 😑
Step Back the Modules
I had such aspirations to write three full games in the month of December… Oh well. Instead, you’ll see three mini-tabletop role playing games. A page for setting, a page for mechanics and characters, a page for phases of play, and a few pages for items and NPCs.
Deescalate Shallow Seas
“Great vague-booking, Jimmy! What the heck does that mean??”
It means I’m down-scaling 40,000 words to write to 10,000. (40K would be about 80 hours of writing over three weeks at my 500 words / hr.) I’m also nixing the idea of a first draft – We’ll start at the beginning, but correctly this time.
I had a long rant for you about how tools and what we set out to do shouldn’t consume nor command us… how goals aren’t our tyrants – we’re our own masters yadda yadda ya…
It sounded better spoken. Maybe you’ll hear it someday if Audacity recovers 😁 Or I’m short on post ideas 😅
Whatever the case, take care! I’ll aim to get something cast-worthy your way soon ~
November was absolutely a stellar month. Though I failed at getting all my 2019 media posted online, my knowledge of RPG game design and moderating of tabletop games is ready to be exercised.
And let’s not forget the podcasting. Writing, recording, editing, and distributing a cast every week has not only been fun – it has seen the most interaction with an audience I’ve ever had for a regular publication (I’m ignoring interaction on my published games and modifications). For such a positive endeavor, one should keep it up, no?
So where does that leave us?
Well, December is not only the last month of the year, but the last one of the decade. That means a lot will be happening – parties, food, friends… you know the drill.
With that and how fulfilling November was, lets end this decade with a blast ~
My Goals Due EOM:
Podcast
If it’s not broken, don’t fix it. If it’s working, don’t stop. Of course I will aim to improve quality, but for most folks, quantity and regularity is valued over quality. (And I need to put this mic to further use!)
TTRPG Modules
I made a rule system in November. Now it’s time to apply it: Three modules at least will be created using the rules, all of it ready for play.
I’ll leverage two derived IPs and one unique: Star Wars, Mobile Suit Gundam, and my universe of Shallow Seas as a one-shot demonstration of the rules. (Maybe the Halo IP too, as it has an example of recharging health!)
Shallow Seas Draft 1
I’ve a solid outline, I’ve a solid character theme, I’ve added context to the fictional world, and I’ve written 40,000 words already. Can I finish a first draft of this book? Dang straight.
Celebrate EOY
How better to celebrate the turn of the calendar than with friends? I’ll go meet a few of them abroad while partying with a number who’ll come to Las Vegas.
To keep those who I won’t see appraised of what’s going on, I’ll also craft my end-of-year letter, a useful review of the last 365 while reminding me of the Good and the people who made the time alive worth it and worth looking towards more.
How does that sound? To me, pretty good. December is going to be playful, purposeful, and productive. It’s exciting to think about what I get to share with you to cap off the decade as we go into 2020. I’m ready. What are you going to do?
