The Riverside Press-Enterprise
Accountability is key for making progress toward your goal
How are you doing on those
New Year’s resolutions? Don’t be too hard on yourself if you’ve let them slide. It’s challenging to stick to a new routine, especially if there’s noone holding you to it except yourself.
In January, I asked Inlandia Board and staff about their New Year’s resolutions: What projects they were committing to this year. I reported that my own were: Read two books each month; keep up with my poetry practice, including both writing and submitting; and — this is the biggie — finish my memoir.
One of the keys to success, I’m learning, is accountability. Having to report on your progress can help you stick to the path and remind you why you started. It can be humbling if you have to report that you’ve made zero progress, but the right person in your corner will encourage you to keep going. Every new day can be a fresh start. But taking that first step toward accountability can be daunting. It means saying out loud, or via a text or an email or even in print, what you intend to accomplish. It means choosing wisely who you will trust with this information, because it must be someone who will provide the necessary motivation without sending you into the doldrums if you encounter setbacks.
Dear reader, I think I have unwittingly made you my accountability partner.
The internet defines an accountability partner as “someone who supports another person to keep a commitment or maintain progress on a desired goal.” I can imagine accountability partners working in many different scenarios, but today I’m thinking specifically of my projects. So here is an update on my progress to date.
In January, after reading a column by Tod Goldberg about books that shaped the way Generation X views the world, I decided to seek out a book on that list I hadn’t yet read: “Columbine” by Dave Cullen. In the process, I also ran across “A Mother’s Reckoning” by Sue Klebold. Reading the two together provided a deeper level of insight than I would have gotten with one book alone. I didn’t plan it this way, but I highly recommend this strategy if you’re interested in multiple viewpoints. Goal No.1 accomplished.
Another goal is, of course, to keep up with my poetry practice. I can rely on my monthly writers’ group to ensure that I write at least one poem each month to present to the group, even if sometimes I don’t get to it until the day-of, as was the case this month. Because I’ve been writing more prose than poetry lately, I had trouble getting started. So I did what I often suggest to others: I looked to a writing prompt. I am a fan of ekphrasis — writing inspired by art — and have previously used Rattle’s Ekphrastic Challenge to kickstart inspiration. But that’s only half of my goal; the other half is to submit. On the last day of the month, because it was the deadline, I quickly submitted my poem to Rattle’s contest. With a full-timeplus job and multiple other obligations, I’ll take that one hastily-written poem submitted on the last day of January as a win.
Finally, my big goal is to finish my memoir. I’ve been stalled out at about 38,000 words for months, but I took steps that will inevitably get me closer to the finish line. For one, I invested in myself and my writing by signing up for a memoir-in-a-year workshop. I’ve never embarked on a months-long intensive workshop. By participating, I should have a completed draft by October. But the workshop is online, we’ve had only one virtual meetup so far, and the seminars don’t officially start until March. What to do to maintain momentum in the interim? Another participant and I made a plan to meet up once each week and share pages and progress. We keep each other accountable.
So why do I need you, you may wonder? Part of me needs this public commitment because it’s easy to make excuses. For January, I could have easily justified a lack of progress based on work obligations alone, but that was compounded by a bout with COVID. I could have easily let myself slide. But I didn’t. Because if I can do it, you can do it.
I’m already halfway to my goal for February: The memoir workshop’s assigned reading, as it happens, is another pair of books that complement one another: “Wild” by
Cheryl Strayed, a memoir about the author’s lifeaffirming trek on the Pacific Crest Trail, and “The Wanting Was a Wilderness” by Alden Jones, which is a craft book slash memoir that deconstructs Strayed’s writing craft in “Wild” alongside Jones’ own transformative wilderness journey. I’m already finished with Strayed’s book (one down for February!) and three quarters of the way through Jones’. And I’ve cracked the 40,000 word mark on my memoir.
As of this writing, I have not yet written or submitted a poem — but my writers group meets next Sunday.
One month down, 11 to go.
Cati Porter is a poet, essayist, and executive director of Inlandia Institute. Learn more about her writing life at www.catiporter.com and her work with Inlandia at www.inlandiainstitute. org.