Thoughts on the New Year ...

I caught up with my delightful friends Jeff and Jane today (along with, of course, my lovely guy Steve) and Jane, who is one of the world's best career coaches (imho) queried about my personal blog and my novel and how I was juggling them both. She suggested that we put our effort in where our true passions lie, and that if the lion share of my time and attention was directed to the blog, that that was I truly loved doing and that I should maybe shelve the novel at least for a while.

It got me thinking, not least because I had had much the same thought just before Christmas when I wondered to myself whether I should even pursue the novel as a career option since what I really wanted to do was travel the world, go to film festivals, see TV shows filmed, go to Comic-Con and blog about it all.

But as we talked, and I thought it through further, I realised that even though my epiphany and Jane's collaborating insights were spot on, that I have to see the novel through if only because I have worked on it for 10 years plus and it represents a significant outpouring of my creativity.

I may never be a novelist and being a pop culture blogger may become my career, but I still need to make sure the novel sees the light of day in some form, and I can gauge peoples' reactions to it.

I think this will be the year that I finally sort out what really drives my passions - although as the above realisation clearly illustrates I think I know already - and I really have to work hard to set my priorities  so I don't waste time but also so I can rest and relax as needed to, as endless activity will only result in me becoming burnt out and jaded and then nothing gets done.

So what are my priorities this year?

(1) sparklyprettybriiiight.com

Like you didn't see that coming!

I must admit that my passion for this blog has surprised me.

Not that I didn't realise how much I liked movies and TV and books and music and ... and ...

That was evident years ago and only a fool could have missed it.

No, what surprised me was it grew in 2012 from a blog hosted on Blogger with 132 posts to a self-hosted blog (via Godaddy) with 429 or so posts. That's a lot of extra posts in one year and speaks volumes about where my passions lie.

So of course this will be the main priority this year.

But so that it can work as well as possible, here's a few things I have in mind:

(image via mimiandeunice.com)

(a) No blogging on Mondays, Thursdays or Saturdays unless something utterly amazing and compelling grabs me and must be blogged about. BUT it must be truly amazing or compelling to merit a post on these days.

The reason for these days off is to (1) give me a break from writing large posts and avoid burn out, and (2) give me the time needed to read, watch TV programs, go see movies etc.

In regards to point (2) what I found last year was that I was watching say the first episode of a show to review it, and then not finding the time to watch the rest of the series, or reading part of a book to get a feel, reviewing it and then not finishing it.

That kind of defeats the purpose of the blog if I am not fully immersing myself in the pop culture I love.

It was a classic case of the "tail wagging the dog" and I need to restore my consumption of pop culture to the main game in town, with the blog flowing out from it, not the other way around.

(b) The emphasis on the blog will shift to movies and TV primarily with music and books coming up behind. That doesn't necessarily completely mirror my passions but does reflect what gets re-blogged the  most from Triberr etc.

(c) Get it re-designed asap so it looks slick and professional, use analytics to calibrate what goes up when, and find ways to monetise it once my readership increases.


(2) myauntthecarnivorousmoose.com

(image via 2leep.com)

This is my longest running blog, having been around since 2005, and has been a little, OK a LOT, neglected this year as sparklyprettybriiiight.com came into its own.

But it remains important to me because I use it as an ongoing journal of my life/photo album and I am not ready to give it up or go weekly with my posts.

So to make sure it gets the lovin' it deserves, and I retain my sanity (two blogs is a lot of work!) I am going back to 1 photo a day - major events excepted - and a single descriptive paragraph.

No more, no less.

Sanity saved.

(3) Get back to exercise regularly and eating well

Yeah I know this is a New Year's Resolution as cliched as they come but one I intend to follow through on.

Truth is I mostly do eat well and exercise but have rather fallen off the wagon of late (not just at Christmas) and have become lazy with my healthy cooking, and eating stuff I shouldn't at work and sometimes exercising only once or twice a week.

Not enough.

So it's back to a rigorously healthy diet, lots of exercise but so that I don't fall into an exhausted heap at the end of the week, nights early enough to accommodate the 4.45 wake ups.

** I am sure there is more I could write about but these are the three main points and I may blog from time to time on how successfully I am achieving them.

To 2013 and beyond!