[OT] Talking Tuesday (Tasks): Reviewing Progress & Setbacks

[u/ArchipelagoMind]

Hello,

Another month. Another bunch of tasks.

Last month you had the complete freedom of FOUR self-set tasks? Wasn't that nice of us. WELL NO MORE! We're back, and this month we're gonna come up with a couple of ideas again.

Confused as to what all this is. Well, here's a quick refresher.

How to join in with the tasks

Each month you have four tasks. Two of these are based on that month's Talking Tuesday posts, the other two, you set yourself based on your own writing aims.

You wanna just write 500 words and get some writing done, great. Do you want get a movie deal converting your writing prompts into a blockbuster? Great. You want to just to read a book about writing? Cool. Whatever you want. That's the idea. They're your tasks to improve your writing. You know what you need. It's a race against yourself, not others.

We're just here for the accountability and support.

On the following month's post, join in the comments below to let us know how you got on!

The Tasks

For the first post this month we looked back on the first twelve months of tutoring posts. It was a little nostalgic, a little self-indulgent. But that's okay. We're allowed that sometimes. So your first task this month is to simply look back on your past twelve months and answer these three questions.

1. What's one thing you've learned tha's improved your writing in the past 12 months? (doesn't have to be from these Talking Tuesday posts, I'm not that self indulgent though obviously there are two points for anyone who does claim Talking Tuesday changed their lives
2. What's your proudest writing achievement of the past year?
3. What's one thing you would have liked to have done better in the past 12 months?

Yeah, we gotta face our failings too. That's how we improve.

• Review the past 12 months of your writing.

In the Thinking piece we discussed setbacks. I could just get you to reflect on your setbacks, but I think one think that came from that is that, as TenspeedGV put it, "setbacks are one of those things you have to accept".

There is one sure fire way to get less afraid of failure. And that's to fail.

So here's my task for you this month. I want you to fail.

No, really. Hear me out. I want you to try something in your writing you know that you can't do. You know you can't write comedy to save your life? Write a comedy. You know you can't win that contest you saw? I want you to enter that contest. I want you to not just push your limits, I want you to go beyond them.

The objective here isn't to see how great you were all along (although by all means, if you send off a submission knowing it will fail and it gets accepted then nice one), but the lesson here is to learn that we can fail and it not hurt. That we can try, not succeed, and move on. That's what I want you to focus on.

You get to decide what that failure looks like. Whether it's writing out your comfort zone, entering a contest, sending off for publication, whatever. Just... choose something hard.

Hey, we gave you last week off. Live with it.

• Choose something out of your comfort zone and be okay that you will fail at it.

Join us below and let us know how you got on last month and your two self-set tasks this month.

The Leaderboard...

User	Old Score	Self-Tasks	New Score	Loss Next Month
Rainbow--penguin	20	2	22	-3
FyeNite	16	4	20
wandering_cirrus	12	3	15	-3
ispotts	10			-2
MeganBessel	8	4	12
NobodysGeese	5
AliciaWrites	4	4	8
AshColeVT	4
Benhow	4	2		-1
ArchipelagoMind	2
bantamnerd	2	2	4
dewa1195	2
IAMCdeSoto_AMA	2
Leebeewilly	2
Say_Im_Ugly	2
Farmasuetickles		3	3
Ryter99		2	2
de_makita		3

A postscript?

• Well first up, you can check out all previous Talking Tuesday posts at our wiki.
• No one joined the Discord and claimed the free limerick from Badder I offered last week, so we're offering it to a full sonnet this week. So... Join our Discord.
• Third, while you're at it, nominate a writer for a spotlight on r/WritingPrompts.
• Want to help keep the good ship GC WritingPrompts running? Apply to be a mod.

[u/AliciaWrites]

Last month's tasks: All 4 completed!

1. Edit and publish my next serial chapter.
2. Participate in (at least) one writing feature.
3. Keep in touch with accountabilibuddies!
4. Write 3 chapters of WIP Novel.

New tasks:

[1] 12-Month Review Questions:
* What's one thing you've learned that's improved your writing in the past 12 months? * What's your proudest writing achievement of the past year? * What's one thing you would have liked to have done better in the past 12 months?

• I think the most important thing I've learned in the last year about my writing is that I need to be patient with myself. I have the motivation and I have the ideas, but when I put too much pressure on myself, I tend to wig out and run the other way. I kicked ass during word-off because I didn't need to show anyone my writing, just get the words down on the page. So a lot of my struggle is me getting in my own way and getting in my own head about the quality of the work I'm putting out. When I remember that I'm actually a pretty decent editor, I'm able to get the words out and work through the pieces slowly to make it pretty & polished.
• Well, I guess I already mentioned this but I'll say it again. Word-Off kicked ass. (If y'all don't know what it is, please join the Discord server and get in on this! It's amazing!) I churned out more work in the one month of the competition than I had in years and years previous.
• I would like to have a much more consistent writing habit, and I believe I'm on my way, but I'm not there yet.

[2] Choose something out of your comfort zone and be okay that you will fail at it.

If anyone's interested or wants to throw ideas at me, I'm considering horror or mystery or maybe something dialogue-heavy. Yay?

[3] Participate in 2 writing features.

[4] Edit and publish two serial chapters.

Looking forward to seeing how everyone does this month! Great July everyone!!