Ignoring all the horribleness in the world at large, I had set myself several personal goals to be more creative in 2020. I both did and did not make all my goals, but the fact that I made any of them at all is, in itself, a success. As I wrote previously I have been struggling to bring creativity back into my day-to-day life on a regular basis, while it’s still not there every day, it’s much more present than it was a year ago.
In review:
- Start Writing Again – I not only accomplished this, I think I blew it away. I’ve spent the entire year exploring my writing process and what works for me. I hope to continue that exploration in the next year. During this exploration I’ve started writing down and plotting a bunch more ideas, two of which I even wrote to completion. I’m also making new habits by breaking old ones in that I have not posted most of what I wrote in the last year. As I sit down to write this, I realize I wrote four short one-shots and 2 longer pieces, of which I only publicly shared two of the short one-shots. Not immediately seeking public gratification for the words I put down was a dangerous habit I learned early in my writing development, and that has not served me and was something I did not even realize I was doing until I began exploring my writing process.
- Lost Uzumaki – Find its ending. Well… I’ve made an effort? In working on my writing process, I’ve at least really figured out why I got so lost on this project and started to figure out what I need to find its ending. Part of it is realizing that what was one story has really become two and I’m in the early or middle of that second book. Oopsie. So, some progress has been made, but as this project has always been a labor of love I’ve always done best at letting it flow as needed and not forcing it. It will get there.
- Kitsune no Tsuki – I didn’t really even touch this goal at all until like the last week or so, but I’m actually okay with that. I’ve already found myself developing some interesting things as I started asking myself questions about the world this story wanted to happen in that I can use for more.
- That Harry Potter fic idea – So yeah… I started thinking about making a try at 50k for Nano and this was the plot I choose to go with, nevermind that it’s really just the first in what will probably be several stories or that the world build has been exploding the more I played with it… but I did it. I had my plot and my world build bible and I brought it into November and I came out with 50,311 on the 29th. I promptly closed the file and ignored its existence for the last month afterwards. (I even told friends that I might hate it now that I’d done it). I’m super proud of myself for setting the goal, putting in the effort and meeting it. I even quit my silly mobile game to do it. (I needed to give it up anyway).
- Five and Six – Ace of Diamond and Sentinel Fusion kind of meshed, though the goals were separate originally. I have an Ace of Diamond idea still tucked away that I haven’t come back to yet, but the world building I started doing for a Sentinel & Guide AU fusion took a surprise twist as I decided to apply it to an Ace of Diamond short story plot for the July Rough Trade Them Sentinel – Bonds. I only had one plot in mind so I didn’t publicly sign up, but I participated for the first 14 days regardless on my own and wrote a story from beginning to end. Upon finishing it I promptly had a little melt down as this was A) my first Ace of Diamond fic, B) my first Sentinel AU, and C) my first Slash pairing. I kind of surprised myself on that one even if none of my close friends were (which really why should they, I had been talking about it for months)
So with all that said I’m really looking forward to seeing what I manage in 2021.
