For those of you who listen to the Drunken Pen Writing Podcast, you’ve heard me discuss my 2023 writing goals on numerous occasions. But for the rest of you, I figured I would list them here as well. That’s not just for your benefit though.

I feel that if I list my goals here in writing, I’ll hold myself more accountable. And as I’m sure many of you can attest to, it’s terribly embarrassing when you tell other people your goals and then end up failing miserably. Especially when those people constantly ask you about your progress in reaching said goals and you either have to downplay your failings or flat-out lie. Well, I’m not doing that this year.

2023 Writing Goals:

• Get accepted to ten publications: One of my major writing goals has always been to get published in a literary journal. The problem is, I hardly ever submitted work. At most, I submitted five times in a single year, and it wasn’t even the same story to all five places. I had absolutely no idea how pointless that was at the time. Now, I know it’s common to get 20 rejections for a single story or poem before getting accepted somewhere. Since October of 2022, I’ve stepped it way up and have submitted to nearly fifty publications, and even though I’m waiting to hear back on more than half of those, I’ve already been accepted twice; one of those has already been published. So as of mid-January 2023, I only need eight more acceptances to reach my goal.
• Get published in a print journal/magazine: This goal is a bit loftier but it’s much more important to me. I have no issue getting published in an online journal. In fact, that’s the standard these days. But my ultimate goal has always been to get published in print. I would love nothing more than to pick up a literary journal on the magazine rack at Barnes and Nobel and see my name inside. There’s no special way to accomplish this goal other than to keep doing what I’ve been doing. I have to submit to as many places as I can and hope that one of the print publications accepts my work.
• Get paid for my work: Coming from a freelance background, I’ve been paid for my work in the past and understand that writing isn’t a lucrative market. But I’ve never been paid by a literary journal to publish one of my stories or poems. It’s one thing to get paid for creating assigned content, but I want to get paid for my creative endeavors. Unfortunately, 90% of the journals and magazines I’ve submitted to don’t pay anything at all, and the ones that do are really tough to get into. That being said, I still have hope I will get paid for something this year. Even if it’s only a dollar.
• Finish the first draft of my novel: This is the most important goal on my list. The whole reason I want to build up my publication history is so I can score an agent and sell my damn book once it’s done. I had planned on finishing the first draft by the summer of 2022, but as of the writing of this, I’m only halfway through. The good news is that the book is coming along better than I had anticipated. Well, at least from a story perspective. My writing pace has not been consistent. Some days I knock out a bunch of pages and other days I don’t write anything at all. It doesn’t help that I have other projects in the works as well. Speaking of…
• Finish the DPW anthology: If you know me from my work on the now-defunct lit journal Drunken Pen Writing, you know I’ve been talking about publishing an anthology for at least two years. And as of now, it’s 99% complete. It has been for a year. But putting it in order, doing the final story edits, and then figuring out how to format and publish the damn thing has been a real weight on my shoulders. If I haven’t been writing a novel it would’ve been out already. No excuses though. I need to see this thing through.

Well, there you have it. I don’t know how impressive those goals seem to some of you. To me, they are like the steps one takes after college. I’ve learned all I need to succeed in the writing world, and now it’s time to put that knowledge to the test.

Even though this list is about me, I would love to hear what your writing goals are. Are you like me trying to get published? Have you already gone through this part and are figuring out the next phase of your writing career? Or perhaps you’re successful and worried about hitting a plateau? Whatever your goals, hit me up in the comments and let me know what they are.