I‘m a high-schooler. Though I’m still on the road to adulthood, I know what busy looks like. Especially to the common, involved teenager.
So how do you keep on top of mastering your writing skills in spite of holding the rest of your life together?
Writing keeps me sane. It’s unbelievably vital to me that I keep it almost as important as my schoolwork.
I was taught countless times that there’s a key first step to success for yourself:
Setting goals.
When writing, regardless of the genre, I find there are three categories of goals I like to set for myself. These are specific ways I’ve broken down to describe how I personally make targets to reach.
Along with these in mind, it’s nice to have some guidelines to keep yourself in check when setting personal writing goals. It’s a tricky thing to commit to. These standards have helped me tons:
Keep it flexible. Make sure what you’re promising to do will work with your schedule. Try to work ahead and catch up if you fall behind. Be able to change plans as your goals evolve and grow.
Be your own worst enemy. No one is a harsher coach on you than yourself. A goal will never be reached without commitment and work. Sometimes it has to be forced upon you. Unfortunately, if you’re an independent writer, you’re left with yourself to cover the job.
Make it public. You don’t have to be the only one keeping you focused- be open to being held accountable by others. One of the best decisions I made when fabricating my one-poem-a-week plan was putting it on my community of writers. Every time I check the site or the feed on my page, I’m reminded; I know that others have my back when it comes to giving me that much-needed nudge.
To be fair, these tips are opinion-based, but know that I have gone through many methods. It’s not a science. Not yet, at least. This is what I find most effective for me, so I hope this can relate pretty closely with other teen writers like me.
The most important advice I can give, though, is to take whatever goal you have in mind to heart. Run with it and keep writing!
*What are some of your most effective goals, and how to you keep them?
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Hi there, Ironnovelist (nice name by the way) here to review your article.
Okay, I am not quite sure if it's an article or a blogpost (I safely assume the latter since you have already mentioned this in your description.)
So let us begin!
Things I liked:
- I liked your informal style of narration. The words were flowing smoothly, formatting was really readable, and it was a very comfortable read. If it's a blogpost, you're doing it wonderfully.
- You're crystal clear about your material. Your thoughts are flowing seamlessly! The points you're mentioning are all detailed and thoughtful (onto this later)
Things you should improve:
- Maintaining quality with quantity is not quite easy. I don't quite agree with your second point. When one of your work, becomes really popular, it becomes really difficult for you to maintain your own standard, (At least that's my experience.) But since you have clearly mentioned that your tips are opinion based, and we all have different opinions, I won't push you to change it.
- I also think that you should use more examples while making your point. It'd give readers much more clarity and deep insights into what your thought process is, what message you're trying to convey.
Content:
I specifically left point two with (later) tag, because I wanted to discuss this in detail. Apart from the second major point, I really liked your overall post. Particularly, the make public point. It's bloody true! Your blogpost strikes a fine cord with most writers and the "connect" of your post is really quite strong. I am not sure about the worst enemy part you mentioned, but the shift out of comfort zone is again really true. You really get trapped in one genre if you keep writing in same style.
So even though your points are opinions based, they're all logical and make a lot of sense. Apart from tiny errors, I was unable to find any major flaw in your writing! Well Done! Impressive stuff!
Hello!
I like it! It looks like the things I was going to say were already mentioned by Biluata. 
I think it's really nice to have set goals in writing, and a plan for how you're going to do it. 
This reminds me of how I need to make one too. 
Anyway, great job on this, and keep writing! 
This is REALLY good!
~Snazzy
Stay Awesome
This is a very sound article with good advice for writers. Do you mind if I add a few more? Sometimes inspiration is key. You might have a really good burst of inspiration to start, and sometimes you have inspiration towards the middle, but sometimes you need a constant source of inspiration. Personally I use music as a source of inspiration to me, but it might just be someone who you can talk to and bounce ideas off of, but you have to be careful of something I like to call "writers constipation" which is when all the inspiration just stops. Sometimes you just have to grit your teeth and sit down and write, even if you have to force every word out and think it over a dozen times. Other than that point, all of your points are extremely valid and well thought out. I read that this is a post for your blog and if all of your articles are this good, then your blog is bound to be a successful blog. I appreciate you taking the time to write this out. The only other thing I could recommend would maybe some examples or explanations for some of your points, or maybe a follow up post on how to carry out such a plan for writing and of course, it it is a blog post, there must be pictures! That is expected of every blog, but for what reason, I do not know! Good luck with blogging!
thanks so much! I plan to write an entry specifically on inspiration and music will definitely be on the list!