New Year's is a hopeful time. People get excited about starting a fresh page and resolving themselves towards a more positive direction in life. I love hearing people's New Year's resolutions: this year I'll reach out to friends more often; this year I'll eat healthier food; this year I'll write every day.

In my experience, however, these resolutions keep us hopeful for about ten minutes and by Jan. 1st, say… 1pm, we're already having a chocolate bar and thinking that we'll start the healthier eating habits on January 2nd.

I'm writing this article to suggest that there is something much more hopeful and powerful that we can do on the New Year than resolve ourselves to "better" behavior.

What we can do is set up concrete goals. A goal is not a manifesto that declares our preference for one behavior over another. A goal is a destination. A measurable milestone. Whether or not we reach it is a yes or no question.

Eating more healthfully is not measurable. Healthy according to who? And how healthy? How consistently healthy? You can have an occasional chocolate bar and still eat healthy. A measurable goal would be: this year I'll be taking a cooking class. That's measurable. You'll either take or not take a cooking class. (I recommend the public classes at "the Natural Gourmet School". A wee-bit pricey, but if you want to learn how to prepare healthy food and get inspired, that's the spot.)

In my screenwriting workshops I discuss goals to great lengths. If you have a character meandering around doing this and that, rather than pursuing a goal, then you end up with that episodic screenplay that nobody can read. You create a portrait rather than a story. If your character is in pursuit of a goal: you have a story. You also have a reader turning the pages because she'll want to know whether your character meets her goal.

In my camera workshop I talk about camera movements in terms of the starting frame and ending frame. The camera movement will take care of itself; you don't even have to think about it if you know where you are going.

In my directing actors workshop: same concept. If the actor doesn't know what concrete goal he is trying to pursue, then you get a self-conscious actor going through lines rather than a real and dynamic performance of someone who is genuinely trying to achieve something.

In my producing workshop: same thing. If your goal is to succeed as a filmmaker, well, that's a recipe for pipe dreams that are never realized. But if your goal is to shoot a short by the end of the month, now we have something to talk about.

Don't think about the path. Don't think about how to move the camera. Think about the destination, and the movement will take care of itself.

What concrete, measurable goal, would you like to achieve this year?

Complete a feature script? Shoot a short? Have the experience of being on a film set, no matter who's film it is?

A few tips about setting goals:

1) It's ok to change your goals. That's not an indication of failure. It's an indication that you're moving; you're doing things; you're learning. Trial and error is a good thing. Having goals at any given time will keep you moving forward. You can change them at any time.

2) Just like with movies: ticking clocks move things along. Your goal should include a time table: Write a script by Dec 31, 2010; Shoot a short on March 5; Get a black belt in karate by the time you turn 50 (that's one of my goals!) Which brings me to the next topic:

3) Identify both long-term and short-term goals. The long-term goals are like your north star. They keep you on the right trajectory, so that when you're working your butt off you can remember what you're working towards. Shooting a short in March is a good idea, but what am I working towards? Why make films? What is it that you want to have achieved in 20 years? Or for all time?

Short-term goals, however, keep you moving forward. If all your goals are long-term, and you don’t lay out concrete steps for the near future, than these goals turn into pipe dreams.

If, for all time, this is what you're working towards, then when do you want to be in 20 years? And if that's what you want to achieve in 20 years, then what should you accomplish in 5 years towards that? And to achieve that in 5 years, what do you need to achieve this year? And so towards that, what do you need to achieve this month? This week? Today?

This is my holiday season gift to you: for the New Year, I'd like you to lay out your long-term and short-term goals as a filmmaker:

For all time: (your mission statement. Why make films? What effect do you want your films to have?) This "for all time" goal is extremely important. When the going gets tough, and it will, this will remind why you are bothering to do this.

In 20 Years:

In 5 Years:

In 1 Year:

This month:

This Week:

Today:

4) MAKE YOUR GOALS SUPER EASY TO ACHIEVE. I find that ambitious goal setting is generally a mistake. They leave you discouraged.

The long-term goals should be hugely ambitious. No limits.

The short-term goals should be easy as pie. Instead of writing a script this week, make it a goal to write crap for ten minutes today. (see my article titled "Writing Exercises to Help You Write Badly". This is no easy feat!)

If you keep your goals easy and gentle, you'll be less likely to be hard on yourself and go down the road of self-criticism (the ultimate path to creative blocks.) Easily achievable goals keep the process FUN, which is what you want. That's the only way to stay inspired and joyful.

If you pursue small, easy-to-achieve goals, you will move forward in leaps and bounds.

Put on your seatbelt!

5) Share your goals. Share them especially with people who are willing to think about and share their goals as well. (Leave your boyfriend out of it. Instead of trying to change him, make it your goal to tell him he's exactly right, every day, between now and the end of this week.)

Sharing your goals is important. We usually keep our goals secret because we've been dismissed and poked fun at too many times. Each time that we demonstrated openheartedness we got squelched (remember last time you did that? When you are, umm, 8…?)

Let's model openheartedness and hopefulness by sharing our goals, and, without blame or reproach, ask our friends not to make sarcastic jokes about our efforts.

One of my goals this year: to write 50 weekly tips.That's one down, 49 goodies to go!

Feel free to comment and share you goals on this page.

With love and appreciation,
Ela

PS - The holiday gift that I want from you: help me spread the word about my new "Weekly Tip" column by forwarding this page to your friends.