The March Goal Slump: How Authors Can Revaluate Their Writing Goals Before Giving Up

Let me guess, in January you shined up some sparkly goals like, drafting 3 books or growing your newsletter by 2,000 subscribers, or maybe something as vague as you would finally get serious about marketing your backlist. And now it is March and the energy has shifted, those clean shiny goals are a little tarnished, maybe have a few nicks in them? Yup. Been there myself. You are not alone and you are not lazy or unmotivated. It is science.

According to U.S. News & World Report around 80% of New Year’s resolutions fail by February. So, if you have made it to March, you are doing better than 80% of people already! Behavioral psychology research tells us that motivation drops significantly 6-8 weeks after initial goal setting, and in a study done by University of Scranton Research only about 9% of people report actually successfully achieving their resolutions at all.

Let’s reframe this. March isn’t to wade through your failure and fall into a pre-spring depression. You haven’t failed you have feedback. Let’s take the month of March to recalibrate the goals we set in the New Year and move forward. According to the above goal motivation statistics, this is a universal concern. The best way to counter the stumble in our success is a quarterly writing goal review. Let’s dive in:

Why Author Motivation Wanes by March

1.       The Dopamine Crash After the Planning High

We are all familiar with the dopamine effect. The little neurotransmitter hormone that gives us a rush of happiness. It can be a huge help to motivation or if left unchecked it can derail even the most motivated person. Dopamine reacts as strongly to the anticipation of the thing as it does to the actual thing. When an author sits down to write out their goals for the coming year, the anticipation of all that could fuel our dopamine and gives us a high. “This is going to be my year!”, “This year I’ll hit that list…” You get the idea. Dopamine, however, doesn’t stick around for the hard work. In fact, you may find yourself sabotaging your goals by scrolling social media instead of buckling down to get your word count in. You may couch rot when you hit a plot issue instead of working through it and move on. Being aware of what dopamine can do for us, but also what it can do to harm us is critical for a person who deep goals and desires for success. This is where resetting in March can help to grab control back from the dopamine monster. By allowing yourself to reassess and reset goals as needed in March you will get a new wave of anticipation and therefore more dopamine to ride on as you move forward.

• Another aspect to consider when looking at Dopamine is novelty vs. habit formation. Novelty (The Spark): or otherwise known as the “honeymoon phase" (Days 1-7) characterized by high motivation, excitement, and enthusiasm. Dopamine spikes, making the initial action feel rewarding, but it is fleeting and fades quickly leaving you to struggle to keep going once the initial spark fades.

• Sustained Habit Formation (The Grind): Involves building automaticity, typically taking 18 to 254 days (with 66 days often cited as an average). I know we were all told 21 days, right?  It is characterized by the slog setting in the second week (Days 8-14) as the newness wears off, requiring the transition from motivation-driven to routine-driven behavior. 

Being able to identify this during your self-reflection will give you the opportunity to find work around, or ways to solidify your goal as a habit.

2.       Unrealistic Creative Timelines:

 How many times have we overestimated our own ability to get things done or the shear volume of tasks to be completed in the time we have allotted. One of the eternal questions in the publishing world is how long does it take to write a book? That one question has a multitude of answers. But, often in our haste to make plans we forget that drafting a book is simply the first step in an involved process. Even if you are traditionally published, your job isn’t finished when you hand in that draft, which I would assume you have revised and edited with multiple passes before you send it along for step two. As an indie author, getting the draft done triggers an avalanche of to-dos before this beautiful baby goes into the world.

Cue, best laid plans motif. How many of us have set a deadline for ourselves to finish a draft, only to be hit with the worst flu of your life, or your computer crashes, taking your draft with it. Perhaps, you hadn’t planned on your sister planning her destination wedding a month before your deadline and you are the maid of honor. Any number of things can be out of your control and therefore not taken into account when setting a deadline. Then, moving out a click on the circle of book publishing, and you are at the mercy of your editor’s ability to keep deadlines. Your cover designer’s ability to get cover dimensions correct so you aren’t going back and forth because a platform doesn’t like the size of your cover.

Estimating timelines is one of the biggest issues for being behind on your goals. While in reflection, you won’t be able to make up lost time, but you can learn from the lessons of bad timing or too tight timelines for next time and include a buffer into your planning. Knowledge is power, and if you are honest with yourself about what you can accomplish realistically, then you can better plan.

3.       There is a need for outcome goals instead of Process goals

Now, let’s reflect on your actual goals. Are your goals more outcome based or process based goals? Meaning, is your goal to publish 4 books in 2026 or is it to write 1,000 words a day?

If you are struggling and feel like you are falling behind and won’t meet your goals, you need to evaluate how workable your goals are. Outcome goals, don’t often drill down to how in actuality you plan on reaching that goal. However, process goals are in and of themselves a good way to

form habits, that in fact will lead you to the outcome goal you seek.

Process vs. Outcome goals for writers, make you have butt in chair words on page energy when you have clear process goals. “What I am going to do daily” opposed to outcome goals energy, which is more like angels singing, birds chirping, “I have achieved my dreams” energy.

If you are finding your goals are sitting in the outcome pile and you can acknowledge that they aren’t lending themselves to the action it will take to achieve the big goal, then it may be time to consider reassessing and creating process goals that will guide you in the direction of the outcome you seek.

4.       Identity Misalignment

 Let’s now look at our goals in the lens of whether they fit your vision or a vision online that doesn’t align with your life and goals. If you are finding your goals seem too heavy, or are tight like an old sweater, it could be because they are misaligned and instead of reflecting you, they are targeting the “six figure author” culture, stem from social media pressure, or were formed out of a comparison you have imposed on yourself.

Remember that no one formula will work for everyone, and no one’s path to publication or success looks the same. If your goals aren’t working for you, it could be because the goals you have are not for you at this time or go against how you work as a creative. March is a perfect time to catch this and make a correction that more aligns with who you are.

I am a huge fan of doing a quarterly review of your goals, March being the first for the year. By giving yourself three months to work on your goals, it gives you a boatload of data that you can then take time in that 4^th month to see what is working, what is tripping you up, and how you can pivot to make adjustments, or entire new goals that fit better with data you have collected.

Life and publishing are not about perfection but progress. Let’s make March the progress forward we need to reach our goals in 2026. Next week I will talk about how to stay motivated as a writer after the New Year Energy fades. Which hits hard in March.