In the RWA chapter I belong to, we have all signed up for a goals type contest.  We write down  our yearly goals for our writing career and pay a few dollars.  At the end of the year, a drawing is held, and if that person achieved his/her goals, they win the jackpot.

Given that we are almost half way through the year, I’ve been looking at what I’ve accomplished towards meeting those goals.  It’s not much, I’m sorry to say.

In order to accomplish the goals I’ve set for myself, I’ve decided to look at it from a project management perspective; something I do in my day job.

My goals are as follows:

• Submit “Unraveling a Gentleman” to publishers/agents.
• Submit a couple of shorter stories to some EPubs

For the first one, I have to finish the final draft.  I’ve set a deadline of July 1st.  I’m panicking because it’s almost June and I’ve not really worked on it very much.  Because I’ve entered this into a contest of sorts, the July 1st deadline is pretty firm.

So with a deadline in mind, I have to decide how to meet it.  Do I write so many words per day?  Or so many pages a day?

Then there are the distractions, such as the web page I’m building, work, holiday’s, other outside activities, my family and time with them, that eat into this time.  And given the fact that I am still working to develop some discipline, I’m worried.

How do you keep your focus on writing? Do you schedule time to write?  Is it given a priority? How do you deal with deadlines, either self imposed or real when life is going crazy around you?  I could really use some advice.