At a glance
- Staying consistent with social media continues to be a challenge for me.
- I accomplished a lifelong dream in 2025, so that was a major win!
- I’ve tweaked my 2026 goals to hopefully help me stay on track.
If you prefer video to text, I cover the same topic on YouTube:
A little over a year ago, I posted a video sharing my goals as an author for 2025.
In this blog, I’m going to recap how I did and what I’ll change in 2026.
Goal #1: Maintain a content calendar
In the past, I owned a business, and maintaining a content calendar was key to staying consistent with my social media posting, which brought me a lot of clients.
Last year, I decided to apply that same practice to my social media channels as an author. It worked once; it could work again, right? Right!
So, how did I do?
Not good.
At the beginning of the year, I went back to using Trello—my go-to tool for making to-do lists—to organize my topics, ideas, keywords, captions, and so on across YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and my other channels.
It felt good at first. But then, it started to feel like I was just creating more work for myself that I didn’t find necessary, and I stopped. “I continue to post, though!”
Famous last words.
Here we are a year later, and my pages haven’t seen the growth that I was aiming for. That’s largely the result of a lack of action. The lack of action came from my lack of planning. That is why the content calendar was so important to me.
What, if anything, will I do to fix this in 2026?
I know that content calendars work, and I’m tempted to set the same goal for myself this year, but I have no reason to believe that I’ll follow through. That means something needs to change.
One thing I can tweak to make this more feasible is to plan to batch my content, because I don’t always feel like creating content on a daily basis. That motivation, that spark of creativity, comes and goes. But if I can sit down when I’m feeling creative, and knock out a bunch of content in one go, I think this will be more doable for me.
So, my adjusted goal is to maintain my content calendar but to do all of the planning and drafting once or twice a week, and that’s it. That way, it won’t be something I’m constantly thinking about.
This means that, for example, on Monday, I’ll record three vertical videos that I can post over the next three days, rather than recording a video every day.
Goal #2: Spend more time with other authors and readers, both virtually and in person
Being social doesn’t come naturally to me, so I knew this one would take effort and a willingness to step outside my comfort zone. I’m introverted, and I’m a homebody. I could never leave the house or talk to anyone, and I’d feel fine.
This isn’t good. Especially because when I recorded that goals video, I had just moved to Colorado from Nevada. It was a fresh start. I wanted to make friends.
How did I do?
Not bad. I had originally said I wanted to attend one in-person and one virtual event a month. It didn’t pan out like that exactly, but I did put myself out there, I do go out, and I did make friends.
Now, it wasn’t all a success. I held this meetup at a local coffee shop, and the only people there were my husband and me. (We still had a great time!)
I also went to a writing conference in downtown Denver…
…which felt great at the time but also kind of killed my confidence in writing conferences, ultimately. I made a few friends, and never spoke to them again. But I put myself out there.
There was a small event for local queer authors at the Spicy Librarian in downtown Denver. I met Anna McG, and bought a book she contributed to called Blood, Sweat & Queers. We’re Instagram friends now!
On Threads, I connected with a bunch of local authors, created a group chat on Instagram, and learned that one of these lovely women lives five minutes down the road. I had coffee with her just the other day. Here’s Scarlett Witherspoon‘s book, Falsely Yours, available through Kindle Unlimited on Amazon:
I also connected with a couple of people online who ended up being wonderful people and supporters, like Bryan Fagan and heart_of_glitter.
All in all, I count this one as a win, so next year, I want to keep this up.
Goal #3: Treat querying literary agents like a business
In other words, I wanted to be even more strategic and intentional about querying than I already was.
How did I do?
I will say that this was a home run because back in October, I got an offer and signed with a literary agent! I talk all about that experience in this video:
Now, I can’t and won’t say that this came down to having a significantly different approach to querying. But looking back, I know that my query package was stronger than others in the past because I got my first full request from my fifth query letter, and I got around five requests total out of roughly 70 queries sent.
That has never happened. I’ve never gotten results like these.
The tone of the query really matched the tone of the book and was very specific to the genre (rom-com). Also, I did a lot of research on Publishers Marketplace before and after writing this book and the query letter, to better understand how to talk about my book, how to package it, what comps to use, etc.
Publishers Marketplace also helped me track down agents to query, based on their recent sales.
This isn’t a goal I need anymore because I don’t need to query anymore. Hooray! I will not miss it. 15 years of querying was enough. It was about 14 years too many.
Goal #4: Take outlining more seriously
This was another win, and it’s one of the reasons why I feel like the last two books I wrote (a rom-com and a fantasy romance) are strong.
I’ve mentioned this book before: Save the Cat. This is still my go-to for structuring my plot. I have read and reread it so many times that it is looking rough. I swear by this book!
If you want to learn a little more about my process for outlining, I talk about it in this video, which is my top-performing video on this channel.
For 2026, the idea is to keep this steady. Especially when I’m starting a new project, because I’m excited, I feel myself rush through outlining, and I always regret it.
This isn’t to say that you need a crazy-detailed outline that’s perfect and complete before writing.
But for me, I can tell when I’m rushing it, and I just need to have a little patience and put in that legwork before I get too far into the writing process.
Goal #5: Be more confident
I’ve known for a long time that I’m a strong writer, but it takes more than that to land a literary agent and find success, and because I queried for so many years with no (apparent) success, it made me question myself and doubt myself.
How did I do this past year?
Not great, but better. I still need to work on this. Here’s what’s interesting, though.
Yes, I feel more confident after signing with a literary agent. But, and I talk about it in my last video…
…when I wrote my rom-com, I knew, I KNEW, with no doubt, that this book was really special. In fact, I said out loud, “This is the book that’s going to get me an agent.”
I have never felt so sure about my writing.
And I was right.
That made me stop and think: What would’ve happened if I had been this confident years ago?
Would that have changed the outcome? Would I have gotten an agent sooner? I’ll never know. But if nothing else, I would have felt a lot better!
I told myself to be careful and not to let signing with an agent be the only reason I feel more confident now. I need to be able to believe in myself without external validation.
Validation will always be nice. I’m not saying I don’t want it or like it. I do and I do. But I can’t let my joy hinge on that.
Actually, I talk about something similar in this video.
I want confidence to be my default, rather than insecurity being my default. That takes intention and repetition.
In 2026, this definitely still needs to be a goal. Affirmations and journaling help me a lot, and I want to continue being more aware of how I think about myself and talk to myself so that I can move away from fear-based thinking to love-based thinking.
Do I have additional goals for 2026?
I do, but honestly, I didn’t pile on many more. I want to write at least two books this year. I want to get a publishing deal.
But, and this is important, I very intentionally didn’t plan on much more.
I’m a very goal-driven person—sometimes, to a fault. Taken to an extreme, this can and will lead to burnout. And at this stage in my life, I am really burned out. Between work, side projects, another out-of-state move, and general life, my tank is near empty.
So, if I were to share another goal of mine, it would probably be to slow down, celebrate the wins, and make time for rest and reflection.
That is just as important as posting on social media, right? 😉
Thank you for making it through another blog. Please say hello to me on Instagram, TikTok, X, or YouTube. I love making new friends!