It’s hard to believe it’s September already. August really passed me by in a hurry. We managed to do a lot of family activities outside: theme parks, hiking, swimming. That helped the month fly by, and it also kept us very busy.

Last Month’s Goals

1. Read three books.
2. Exercise every day.
3. Write at least every other day.
4. Move to the next stage for my duology.

Read three books?

Yes! Aaaaand… I finally finished A Memory of Light. You can read my thoughts on that here. I actually read four books in August, which felt great, including a couple that had been sitting in my Audible library for ages.

With one epic fantasy series out of the way, I’m on the lookout for my next one. At the moment, however, I’m trying to work through some nonfiction books — actual print books — that have been sitting unread on my actual shelves for years. So, I’m in no rush to find my next fantasy series, but I am in the market if you have suggestions.

Exercise every day?

No, but I was generally more active, I think than in previous months. We’ve started using Sunday afternoons to spend time outside with our boys, and that has helped my own activity levels and keeps the boys interested in being outside. I like this little tradition, and I intend to continue it in all weather, as much as we can.

Otherwise, I leaned pretty heavily on a very basic yoga stretch routine to keep myself loose. I have not yet gotten gym membership at our local spot. Frankly, I’m having difficulty seeing where I can fit the gym into my weekly routine at the moment.

That’s definitely one theme from this month: we were so busy that a lot of routine things fell through the cracks. September isn’t looking any more open, and then, oops it’s the holidays. We’ll see how this goes, but I might be relying on Sunday afternoon activities with the kids for exercise for a while.

Write at least every other day?

No, but I fared much better than in July. I wrote nine days in August, including longer-form blog posts, and I made some strides in my duology.

Move to the next stage for my duology?

Yes! I finished reading through Uprooted and began a read-through of New Earth, the part two. I had completed this draft of New Earth sometime last year, and I hadn’t looked at it since, so it has been really exciting to dive back in. I’m about twenty pages into my read-through, and I’ll be aiming to finish it this month.

Goals for September

This seems to be the place where I’ve developed a solid routine, which is a good start.

1. Read three books. I already have one down. The trick will be finishing my current nonfiction read-in-progress.
2. Exercise every day. I’m playing loose with this for now. The goal is to do something every day, even if it’s just a basic yoga stretching routine. I have many things on my to-do list this month, and finding a way to incorporate more exercise into my day is one of them.
3. Write long-form at least every other day. Focusing on long-form, again. I think this is a good way to focus my energy on the writing that takes the most time and effort. I just need to do it at least fifteen days in a month.

Steve D