Why I Challenged Myself to Plan a New Novel

Yes, you read that correctly. No, I’m not leaving Vindico in the dust. Far from it! Instead, But since Vindico is already in-process and largely unplanned––I’m writing it mostly by the seat of my pants––I wanted to challenge myself to actually plan a novel out before I started writing it. 

Airtable has a wonderful, wonderful template to help you do just this. It’s literally called “novel planning.” So, to give myself some experience with the platform and with planning a novel, I decided to take the plunge more as a personal challenge than anything else. 

Personal development is one area where I think nearly all of us need continuous improvement. It’s hard to get everything you need to get done, done without adding in homework like you’re back in school. Let’s admit it! And I saw this as an opportunity to develop both personally and professionally. 

But, It necessary for every career, profession, or art out there. The problem is making time for the practice it takes to juggle several creative projects at once. So, here’s why I chose this path for personal development. 

1. I don’t rate my planning skills. 

Overall, I don’t rate my planning skills highly. You’d assume being a Virtual Assistant would mean I’m confident in this area. In reality, I’m about as confident in planning as I am in anything math-related. Which is to say, I have zero confidence whatsoever. 

If you’re thinking now that my problem isn’t with planning, it’s with internal dialogue, you’d be correct. 

The key to defeating any limiting belief is proving to yourself that what you think isn’t true. It doesn’t work if you just tell yourself it isn’t true, or if someone presents evidence that it isn’t true. Affirmations and evidence are easily debatable to the person with chronic self-doubt, depression, or limiting beliefs. 

Now, I’ve mitigated this by getting more into an “author’s mindset”–I have certain authors I read regularly and I try to dedicate a few minutes every single day to sitting at my writing desk and working on the book. But, since Vindico is the first of a trilogy, I want to be sure that Books 2 and 3 go more smoothly than book 1. 

Why pick a new novel to practice on? Well, the premise of Astolat is Alfred Lord Tennyson’s “The Lady Of Shallot.” This is a poem I’ve known for, oh, probably close to 30 years now. It’s part of Anne of Green Gables, you see, and that was one of my favorite books as a girl. 

I know the story of the Elaine like the back of my hand. John Williams Waterhouse, my favorite painter, did two paintings of her story. I still have the print of the most famous one that I bought to go in my dorm room. 

So, I’m already fairly confident. I know the background material well; I know the inspiration. And I even know how I want to make the story my own. It’s the perfect training ground and confidence booster. Since I love writing anyway, it’s sort of a win/win no matter how you look at it. 

2. I want to juggle multiple projects at the same time intentionally.

Juggling multiple project isn’t a one-and-done lesson. It’s a constant refining process and, if you’ve read some of my past posts, you know I’m big on following processes. I hope that by planning out Astolat, I will work out how to avoid some pitfalls I’m noticing as I write Vindico. 

We all have to learn to juggle multiple things at once. I’ve already done this in my working life, of course. We all have, even if we don’t realize it. But I’d like to juggle my projects more intentionally and less instinctively. If you rely solely on instinct, you can’t always articulate or document what you do and if you can’t do either, that makes selling your service or end product that much more difficult. 

Ultimately, I want a good process in place so that as I write more, I can produce novels more quickly and confidently than I am currently. That, and juggling multiple project will only help as I grow in my Virtual Assistant business. 

Practice makes perfect, or near enough, right? 

3. Using a real project is one of the best way to experiment with various software platforms. 

Being a Virtual Assistant means you also have to stay on top of as many of the different software services as you can. You don’t always know what a client’s needs are going to be and it’s a good idea to have a wide range of knowledge. Well, unless you have an actual present use for those platforms, your knowledge is all theory and no practice. 

I am a ClickUp user for most of the work I do for my business. I love the platform and how you can create documents and connect those to your actual tasks without having to store extra files on your computer. It helps me keep the work I do for my clients separate and it also helps me better organize the work for my blog. But, there are plenty of people out there who do not use ClickUp. 

So, as I mentioned earlier, I’m using Airtable to plan Astolat. Airtable, unlike ClickUp, is based around the idea of a spreadsheet. ClickUp’s basic unit is the Task function. Each task is connected to a list. Airtable’s basic unit is the Base function. Each Base is arranged like a spreadsheet. 

So, on the one hand you have tasks and lists, which is how I usually arrange information. On the other hand, you have tables and spreadsheets. 

Airtable’s novel template gives you spreadsheets for your characters, scenes, locations, and any background stories. It also shows you how to make all the information interconnect so that the story almost writes itself. It’s a much better way of getting everything organized and keeping it organized. 

In fact, if Astolat goes as well in the planning stage as it has thus far, I may use Airtable to help me revise Vindico and write the rest of the trilogy. 

4. Other authors have done it and were highly successful. 

Imitation is supposed to be the highest form of flattery, but it’s also the way we learn and grow. We imitate our parents, older siblings, teachers, people we admire because we want to learn from them and be like them. 

Writing both as art and profession requires a long tutelage. Any session that talks about an “author’s mindset” will tell you to read widely, and read the kind of books you want to write. Imitation your favorite authors. Well, if I’m to do that, then I need to work on, and perfect working on, at least two writing projects at a time. 

Alexandre Dumas famously wrote the bulk of his best-known works within a space of 10 years. Nora Roberts, to cite a more contemporary writer, can average four books per year and had done so for most of my life at this point. 

We have to imitate the people we admire. It’s not being a “copy-cat,” it’s learning from people who have already done what you have done. When you get to where you need to be, then you can work on making the process your own.

Measuring your development in the results.

Ultimately, the results–in this case a fully planned novel–are pretty easy to define. I think that’s kind of key to any attempt at developing yourself. Can you easily measure your success? This isn’t always easy.

For instance, measuring your success with overcoming your limiting beliefs can look different depending on the day, phase of the moon, or, worse still, where you are in your hormonal cycle. Those pre-menstrual depressive episodes are no joke.

Getting into my author’s mindset is a little like this, too. It’s more a marathon that doesn’t really have a defined result except a completed novel. But it’s not a pass/fail necessarily. Are you an author? Well, if you don’t publish, are you still an author? Or are you an author because you’ve written stories?

But if you’re using something as concrete as a writing project, you have a pass/fail. Do you have a complete plan for the novel? Yes or no?

Personal development needs concrete results sometimes, or you may get discouraged when you work on things that you can’t give a pass/fail to.

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