2024 Goals and Aspirations

When you're playing The Sims 4, your character is given the choice of an Aspiration. Those aspirations include goals such as having a successful lineage, becoming a neighborhood confidante, achieving bestseller author status, and much more. Throughout your gameplay, you seek to complete small milestones that move you closer to success. Those small milestones are similar to steps that we all take in our real lives, so as we enter 2024 I want to share my goals and aspirations regarding writing and publishing.

While I could go on about my personal goals, those are a bit more difficult to encompass in a blog post. That being said, I'm hoping my author goals won't be impossible to encompass in a single calendar year.

I spent a bit of time this morning researching what the number 24 means. Roughly 10 billion

results came up on Google, ranging from sources quoting the Bible, The Vedas, the zodiac signs, and even old ladies in New Jersey. I expected each source to have a different, equally vague answer to my question, but I noticed a surprising amount of consistency, mainly involving the word balance.

I've always been one to believe that everything happens for a reason. While I'm raging about paying for new brakes, unfair health situations, or irritating friend drama, I reminding myself that no action/reaction is unnecessary. This belief isn't ruled in anything religious, but it is ruled in an understanding that you cannot change the past and every bad scenario has a positive ending if you're patient enough.

My husband, Nick, and I have spent an unhealthy amount of time these past few months musing about the unfairness of life. Sometimes we drown ourselves in negativity because it's better to complain than to act on our frustrations. That method of existence has been "working," but it's not a good solution. We need to find balance and better understand that every negative situation can become positive.

Just this morning while I was sending agents queries, I was showing Nick the absurd amount of emails I've sent over the months and talking about the declines I've received in response. Some days it's easier to dwell on that information, but as I approach 2024 I want to balance my reactions. I want to see every declined offer as an opportunity to find an agent who will cherish my writing the way it's meant to be appreciated.

My goals for 2024 are simple but I understand that they are not going to be easy to achieve. Acquiring an agent, making public appearances, writing truthfully about difficult personal topics, and enjoying life are just a few of my goals, but most importantly I want to end the year feeling more productive than I did in 2023. I think that approach to existence could benefit us all and I hope my friends, family, and supporters adapt that goal to their own professional and personal lives.

I wish that everyone enters 2024 with a mindset fit to endure the next 365 days. I hope it doesn't include goals that will die off come February, but rather ones that can be celebrated next December. To that declaration, I say good luck and Happy New Year!

-Madison