Scary Questions and Big Plans
tl;dr - "What do you want to have written five years from now?" and "What is Serial Nation Academy?"
Hey y’all, it’s KimBoo! I’m an author and a podcaster who is also a librarian, text technology historian, and former I.T. project manager. I write about a lot of interesting things, I hope you agree! Please consider supporting me so I can keep throwing errata & etcetera into the Scriptorium!
I know! I know! I’ve been out of the loop forevah!!!!!
Yes, a large part of my absence for most of November ‘til now was due to being very sick for most of that time. I picked up a bog-standard cold on my way back from AuthorNation 2025 on Nov. 7th, and it just got worse and worse and worse until I went to the doctor, who gave me the good drugs. It’s over a month later and I’m still sounding hoarse and chugging cough syrup before bed, so you know it was bad.
But now, shockingly, it is December 9th! I’m looking down the barrel of 2026 and wondering what the hell I’m doing with my life.
Skipping the Backstory
There are a few things contributing to my current situation, including health, finances, gig work, and failed expectations. I’ll go into the details at some point, probably on January 31st. But for now, I want to talk about that thing we all love to hate, the end-of-year recap:
Did I meet my writing goals? No.
Did I hit my financial goals? Also no.
Was the real destination the fun I had along the way? HELL NO.
Yes, I did have some fun in 2025! I did meet some goals! I did make enough money not to be homeless or even hungry! I count those as real wins.
But the aspirational goals? Nope, no, nada. ☹
The Diagnosis
I tend to be overly ambitious in my plans, but I am very self-aware of that. I know that I won’t hit all the targets I’m aiming for, simply because I put up too many targets and demand too much of myself. Still, it hurt a little to see just how many targets I missed completely.
As I did the autopsy of the past year, a few realizations hit me:
I’m a writer yet I don’t set long-term writing goals. I myopically focus on the short term, and usually that focus is centered on “what will make me money?” A valid question! …but not the only question.
Part of the reason that past attempts at “coaching” businesses always failed was because of my resistance to being “a teacher.”
The “5 Year” Prompt
I’m going to write a post about this exercise later, but the first problem led to asking myself an important question:
What do I want to have had written five years from now?
Think about it: In five years, what is on the checklist of “completed writing projects”? What do you want to be able to say “I wrote that!” about? You’ve got five years to make it happen, so what makes the cut?
Once I (literally) sat with this question, a lot of priorities crystalized for me. Not just stories, but time, effort, and energy.
Will I still be writing stories for money? You betcha. But I’ll also be writing stories for my legacy. Pin that thought, I’ll be coming back to it in future posts!
The Reframe
The second insight was more like wrestling with an angel. For years, friends and colleagues have told me that I’m a good teacher. I knew they were wrong because I do not have typical “teacher traits” such as extensive patience, a willingness to repeat myself a lot, and a sustained commitment to student excellence.
If that sounds like the description of an elementary school teacher, that’s because it is. That was the entire concept I had around being “a teacher.”
Until a few friends ganged up on me over the past couple of weeks and gave me a whole different paradigm: “professor.”
While I am not, technically, a professor (I have no desire to rejoin higher ed in any capacity, if I can help it; I did my time!) it’s the idea that a professor is not just a teacher but also a scholar, a collaborator, an author, a presenter, an expert.
That I can do!!!!
Again, something I plan to expound on in later posts, but the core of this reframing allowed me to reconsider teaching and coaching again.
Specifically: teaching authors about serials and serialization.
I’ve had people ask me to do this, and several people who attended my AuthorNation 2025 presentation on the topic told me that they learned a lot and would love to learn more. I wrote the book on it. I have presented on it locally and nationally and on multiple podcasts. I write about it. I study it. I am, in fact, one of the few experts on “modern serials and serialization for authors” anywhere.
Thus begins my Professorship Era!
And, more importantly, thus begins Serial Nation Academy!
MORE COMING AT YOU SOON!
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So exciting, KimBoo! I think you're an excellent teacher and would also love to learn more from you.