New year, new decade.

The last decade was, at least professionally, right on track. No, seriously. I’ve had a loose arc for my career in mind since I was 15 or so. I’ve hit the milestones I wanted to hit, and further, have hit a bunch of milestones I didn’t even expect to hit.

But the job isn’t done. The job is never done. The arc forever rises, a rainbow elevator to the sky. I’ve got this next decade to think about. And the decade after that. And — holy shit! — the decade after that. (That is, provided I don’t get cancer, don’t catch some flavor of exotic wildlife virus — Wombat Flu!, don’t get my head knocked off by a flying car, don’t get serial murdered by some freakshow who wants to wear my beard as a codpiece.)

Intuitively, we probably all understand what needs to be done, but thing is, we can pretty easily repress and conceal our intuition — those things we grok in our gut — and for me, it’s a good idea to get this shit down on paper. And by “on paper,” I mean, on an electronic format that is transitive and probably won’t be around in 100 years! Hooah.

The new year and new decade is now upon us. Sprung like a leg-hold trap – snap! While I have you here, wriggling and mewling, it’s time to vocalize the intuition and vomit forth the Shit You And I Need To Do As Writers.

Everybody needs a plan.

Here’s the plan.

Hit The Ground Running

Stop dicking around. A lot of self-proclaimed writers talk about writing. Don’t be that. Don’t do that. The only way you should talk about writing is if you’re actually writing. Otherwise, you might as well be fantasizing about this dragon you punched, or this unicorn to whom you made sweet, sweet mythical love. Did you really fight the Humbaba in the deepest wood? You didn’t? Then don’t talk about it.

Same thing goes for writing.

Stop talking about it.

Start doing it.

And, hey! Looky-looky, no time like the present. You want to keep talking about your novel? Shut up and start writing your novel. Got all these grand plans? They don’t mean a wicker basket of wallaby shit if you’re not taking steps to execute those plans.

It’s 2010 — and by the way, that’s pronounced twenty-ten, not two-thousand-and-ten, be cool, I need you to be cool about this — and that means you have a fresh opportunity to hit the ground running.

Today is January 1st. Today, I want you to write.

I don’t give a mealy-mouthed fuck what it is. Just write. A blog entry. A poem. A random chapter of an as-yet-unwritten novel. A letter. Whatever. Write, write, write. You may write without a plan for today (though you’ll need to get one together to actually make it count), but for today? Just write.

Hell, I get it. It’s been the holiday. You’ve probably slackened. I know I have. The whole goddamn country just sighs and grunts and relaxes during these last two weeks — belt loosened, gut out, sphincters gone all floppy like the elastic in a pair of busted underpants. Time to tighten your panties. Time to cinch up the ol’ belt and suck in the gut. Just dive in. Don’t think about it. Don’t get used to the lull.

Write!

Write.

Write.

Write Every Goddamn Day

Dreamers dream. Writers write. It’s equal part job and life.

And so you must do it every day.

I won’t natter on overmuch about this, because I’ve already stuffed your brain canals full of this particular advice, but I’ll repeat the important parts:

Writing is a muscle. Use it, and it strengthens. Fail to use it, and it atrophies.

Writing daily prepares you for the ritual habit; it’s too easy to let the act fall to disrepair.

Set a target. Hit the target. You can aim low at first, that’s okay. A thousand words a day? Do it. Then increase the target as the days and weeks go on and your penmonkey writer-muscle bulks up.

Don’t write too much, though. Once in a while you can have a 5,000 or 8,000 word day, and that’s awesome — but some element of quality over quantity must be considered. You write too much daily, and you could burn out, or simply churn out a factory line of bubbling sewage day in and day out.

Know your limits. Hit those limits. Stretch them when you must.

Write every goddamn day.

Dreamers dream. Writers write. Decide which you are, and habitualize.

Finish Something Big

You want to aim small, go ahead. Me, I think, “Go big or go home. And when you’re at home, put on a sundress and make muffins in your E-Z-Bake oven and when the day is done, drown yourself in the toilet after swallowing a fistful of veterinary medication.”

Since I don’t want to die bloated, my belly full of canine tranquilizers, I plan on going big. I have another novel to write, so I’m going to write it. Hell, I’m not going to stop there. I’ve got another spec script in me. I’ve got a comic book. I’ve got a few more transmedia properties to develop out with my writing partner. Hell, I might have two novels. In 2010, I’m going big.

And so should you.

At the very least, finish one big thing. Plan it. Direct yourself to do it. And then finish it. First draft, at least, but I’d advise you incorporate plans to work through one or two subsequent drafts this year.

Why finish something big?

Well, first, if you plan this as a career, you can’t live off the sales of a short story. You can’t live off the sales of a 100 short stories, probably. You’re not Hemingway. The times won’t allow it. What I’m saying is, the phrase “go big or go home” actually has some pragmatic meaning — if you’re not willing or able to complete something of reasonable magnitude, you might as well just throw up your hands and be done with this as a career and relegate it purely to a tenement apartment in Hobbytown. (By the way, every time I hear the phrase, “throw up your hands,” I imagine doing the technicolor yawn and retching up a pair of severed hands. That is not a healthy image, but it’s in there. Like a termite infestation.)

Second, finishing something big feels good. It feels healthy. Like a great purging (perhaps like the throwing up of one’s hands!). It tastes of progress.

Third, finishing something big makes everything possible. It’s like climbing a mountain. You climb a mountain (erm, I’ve never actually climbed a mountain, this is purely metaphor), and at the top you feel triumphant, yes. But you’re also looking for the next mountain. You finish a big project, and you know you can do it. You know that other big projects await. You know it’s your job to kick them in the teeth.

It’s 2010.

Finish something big.

You Will Build Audience, And This Audience Is Your Tribe

You do not write in a vacuum. (Nor in a vacuum cleaner, for they are loud, and will enflame your deepest allergy.) People like to think they write for themselves, not for other people.

That is not the way of the writer. The Do of the Word. The Zen of the Pen.

We write to be read.

That means we need an audience.

Writing as a career is a misnomer, then, as the actual act of writing does not constitute the entire breadth and depth and width and weight of the job.

Writing is but one part. Another part is building your audience. Find your niche. Bring people to you. Work to engage them. Learn what it means to write for other people. If you write for yourself, mistakes are acceptable. When you write for others, mistakes are unforgivable. Their interest matters. Yours matters only when it coincides with the interests of your audience.

In a perfect world, this means that the Things You Like To Write have an inbuilt audience that you can tap. You want to write a hilarious mystery series at an alpaca farm, great. Find the audience. Find those who like their authors to bring the funny. Find the mystery fans. Find the alpaca breeders, or the bestiality aficionados.

Connect with them.

These people are your tribe. They will read your stuff. They will buy your shit.

They will tell others.

Do not be a dick to them.

In fact, try not to be a dick at all. This isn’t to say you can’t be critical — you should be a critical thinker — but you have to walk the line. Judgment of others will get you nowhere. Getting on your soapbox and telling The World that “anybody who likes Facts of Life is a total douchenozzle dickbag dipshit” assures you of one thing: those in your audience who like Facts of Life (Tootie Rulez!) are going to be offended, and they may not buy your book, play your game, watch your movie, purchase your “prostate massage instruction manual,” and so on, and so forth.

You may not know the margins of your tribe.

Be careful not to alienate those who might now be in, or will soon join, your tribe.

Have a voice. Speak to your audience.

But don’t hate your audience, or treat them like assholes.

Realize That This Is The Coolest Thing Ever

You are a writer. This is the coolest thing.

Appreciate that for a minute.

Sure, writing isn’t just about writing. You don’t have to love every day of the work, or love every aspect of it.

But you should love it overall.

You should be immensely satisfied — this has nothing to do with happiness, mind, which is a whole different bag of babies.

It’s better than pushing a broom. Or cleaning teeth. Or building houses. Or training hamsters for a hamster circus.

I’m not denigrating those jobs. I’m saying that, for me, and ideally for you, writing is better than all other job-flavored things.

If it’s not?

If you’d rather be doing something else?

If something else makes you happier?

Then do that thing instead. Stop fucking around with something you don’t really love to do. Once more, I say: find your niche. Follow your bliss. Hunt the wily beast of satisfaction, and pin it to the forest floor with your trident of desire.

Okay, wow, that sounds kind of pornographic. But, hell with it. It’s too late. I said it. It’s out there. Just keep your “trident of desire” in your pants until we’re done here.

Point is: being a writer is pretty g-dang awesome.

Recognize this, and feel empowered in the New Year.

Put It Out There

Two words:

Get published.

Make a plan to get your work out there to the audience.

Traditional route? Excellent.

Your own way hacked through the jungle? Do it.

Carve your plan in the wall. Hew a path through the stone.

Put it out there. Get published.

It’s the new year.

It’s the new decade.

It’s time to do some shit.