Developing Good Writing Habits
Or - How to Not Completely Drive Yourself Insane with Writing
Alright, fess up…
How long has it been since you last wrote? Since you last read a book?
When was the last time you really thought about the dialogue in your favorite movie?
For some of you, it may have been very recently! For others of you, it might have been a while, and that’s ok! But perhaps, it’s time to consider how we can make time for some of these fundamental things that help make us better writers.
What we’re gonna talk about today, is developing good writing habits! I’m gonna let you in on how I developed the habits I have, as well as some common pitfalls and misconceptions when it comes to developing and maintaining a creative habit.
Obviously, this is just what has worked for me, and it may not work for you! But hopefully, at least some of this can assist you in your writing journey!
Some of them are obvious, but we all need to be reminded of the obvious, sometimes.
Keep Learning!!
Usually, you’re supposed to save the biggest piece of advice for last, but this is so important to me, I had to put it first. I think everyone, writers included, can have a habit of getting stuck sometimes.
We get comfortable with what we’re making, and sometimes we forget to really look at what we’re writing. When was the last time you re-read something you wrote, in full? Not just to edit, but just to experience it, as a reader would. When was the last time you read something someone else wrote not as a reader, but as an author?
Perhaps it’s been a while?
It’s ok!! But it is something to fight against too.
When you stop paying attention to the things you’re making, when you go on autopilot, you stop noticing your mistakes, you stop noticing how you can do and be better.
This is what the ideal cycle of creativity should look like, the cycle of continuous growth:
If you haven’t seen this graph before, it’s from Shattered Earth! It’s hands down, the best chart of creative growth I have ever seen. Granted, it’s made for artists, but I think it applies to every creative field or even just any field that requires constant learning.
You can see when you look over it, that paying attention to your own work is key!
Additionally, taking notice of others work, so you can identify where you yourself can do better, is also key!
Without those two components, the two lines on the graph would stagnate, and so you as a writer would stagnate.
This is why apathy with your own work can be the death of it.
It’s double why you should also consume the type of content you want to make!
Hence: KEEP LEARNING!
Keep consuming resources on writing, read things from authors you admire, watch movies, and think carefully about the dialogue and why it works. You can learn from just about any type of media, you just need to be paying attention to it, and actively engaged with the content.
How does it make you feel? How did it achieve that feeling? Is this something you can try in your own work?
What I do is this: Once a week, I make time for at least one writing-related video, and I try to incorporate some of it’s points into my own work. Also, I try to read at least twice a week, be it fanfiction or a novel or whatever.
This means that 1 - I am thinking critically about my own work and 2 - I am finding new ways to improve my work, by consuming things I enjoy.
This sounds basic and nebulous, but really, good writing isn’t a secret. There’s no magic way to get better at it, you just have to dedicate yourself to it, and dedicating yourself to learning is one facet of that.
Here’s some resources I recommend you check out, and consider adding to your weekly routine:
This list of people are diverse, and they write and do a lot of different things (fantasy author, fiction analyzer, editor, etc.) but they all have great videos (free, on YT) which I think apply to everyone’s writing.
And this is just scratching the surface! There are services like Skillshare and Master Class (neither of which I’ve had the time to check out in full yet!) which might also help you. If you don’t mind the subscription fee.
Stop Waiting
If you’ve read some of my comments on writing before, you might have heard me talk about how I think ‘waiting' for inspiration’ is a farce.
How many times have you sat at your desk, staring at a blank page, and just… waited? Convinced that some divine spark of inspiration would hit you and give you the motivation to put words down.
Stop waiting!
Inspiration is not the end all be all, and writer’s block isn’t real.
Write whatever comes to mind first, and edit it later. Often, you’ll find what you wrote was just fine. Good, even. It was just that in your head, you were convinced that whatever you’d write wasn’t good enough without inspiration.
Your words are good enough, just as they are. They don’t need to be motivated by some grand design. They just need to come from you.
Waiting for inspiration is a bad habit we all have to work at breaking. Practice this continuously, and you’ll find that you’ve broken it and that you have a much easier time writing the things you want to.
This goes along with another one of my tips: Don’t be afraid to have more than one project to bounce between.
Brandon Sanderson writes this way, and if it’s good enough for him, then I think we all might want to consider adopting it. Have more than one thing you’re working on, and if you can’t make yourself write for one project, switch to another! Skip ahead a chapter! Do whatever it takes to make it so you can get at least something down on the page.
It’ll take the pressure off crafting the perfect story, and allow you to concentrate on just getting the story made.
Perfection is for editing.
1/2 Hour
This last one goes along with my tip/habit from above, but this is the most practical and actionable item on the list, so I wanted to give it it’s own space.
Write, at least, one-half hour each day.
If you’re just getting started in developing a writing habit, this is the easiest way to give yourself space to practice the above and to get your monthly word count up.
Often, I find that I write for much longer than half an hour, and other times I find that half hour to be a struggle, but no matter what, I wrote for that long!
Half an hour is not a long time, but you’d be amazed at what you can accomplish with just one of those a day. Half an hour a day is 3.5 hours a week. If you write at least 50 words a minute, that’s 10,500 words.
In a month, that could be 42,000 words.
Rarely, do I think I type quite that fast when constructing a narrative, but this does help illustrate what that half an hour a day could be, one day.
Usually, I spread those words out across multiple projects: These blog posts, novels, scripts, short stories, fanfiction. Without that half hour, I wouldn’t get nearly half as much done.
Without it, I don’t know if I’d get any writing done at all.
That single half-hour keeps the momentum in my projects. It doesn’t allow me to forget about the things I’m writing. It keeps the love I have for my characters alive, and it’s the thing that allows me to finish projects.
Consider trying this, if nothing else. I think you’ll find that it helps a lot!
Good luck writing my friends, and as always, I wish you health and happiness! <3