#Writing Goals

[lavender-gloom]

lowkey guys, remember to write for yourself too. i abandoned my favorite wip of all time for two years because i thought other people wouldn’t like it. that sucked, and i decided to stop caring if other people will think it’s weird and write what i like. it’s made me a lot happier since i’ve accepted that

[defnotmadie]

the one thing i want to be able to do as a writer is make people come back to something ive written. i want that piece of text to haunt them, i want their thoughts to be briefly consumed by this. i want this to be something they remember long after its time. thats the one thing i want to do

[elephantshoetoo]

You know when you get one of those readers who comments on every chapter of your fic, pointing out their favorite parts and quoting lines that really resonated with them?

Yeah, as a writer, this is an absolute gift. ❤️

[phantomkinoc13]

WRITE NOVEMBER!

Because nanowrimo decided to allow AI bullshit this year, we’re saying fuck ‘em, and doing our own november writing prompts!

November is still national (novel) writing month, but we say NO AI IN ART OR WRITING!! Join us saying No to ai in writing with No-AI-November, and do WRITE NOVEMBER this year, instead!

HOW IT WORKS: You can write as you normally would, set word count goals, work on your novel, your fanfics, or just writing scenes you want to write throughout November. You can optionally choose from the list of weekly themes, or daily prompts as you’d like, for inspiration.

REBLOG THIS POST, & USE THE TAGS: ‘write November’ ‘novel November’ or ‘no-ai-November’ as well as any other writing tags you feel appropriate.

Feel free to use either of the images above, when posting writing. Use this post or make your own to post your writing goals, and any work you want to share!

Let’s Write! ✍🏼 💻

[tahbhie]

So you want to write a novel before 2025 runs out, huh?

10 actions you should include in your list to make that dream a reality.

1. Practice Time Blocking  

Trust me, you need it. Allocating specific blocks of time for writing can significantly boost your productivity and help you stay focused. Emphasis on ‘stay focused’.

2. Have an Idea Reservoir or Tank 

Create a dedicated space to store all your ideas during brainstorming sessions or whenever inspiration strikes. I recommend Google Docs and Notion to keep everything organized and easily accessible.

3. Watch More Movies and Read New Books 

There's no better way to expand your horizons than consuming diverse media. This is such a great way to spark fresh ideas and provide new perspectives for your writing.

4. Listen to Writing Podcasts and Join Helpful Newsletters  

Stay updated and inspired by listening to writing podcasts and subscribing to newsletters that offer tips, advice, and industry news. It changes everytime. Who says 2025 would be any different? It's best to be prepared. 

5. Create a Playlist 

Arrange your favorite tracks in a way that suits your writing mood. Music can be a powerful tool to set the tone and mood. It helps you feel relaxed and aid scene projections. It also enhances your creativity.

6. Join an Active Writer's Community 

Yes, it's that important. Whether it's an online forum or a local group, being part of a community provides valuable feedback and critique. Engaging with fellow writers also offer support and motivation.

7. Build Your Social Presence  

I feel this isn't addressed enough. If you want people to get invested in your work, start promoting your book and what you do even before it's finished. Share your journey and let people fall in love with your process and personality.

8. Write a List of Comfortable Spots  

Identify and list the places where you feel most comfortable and productive while writing. Having a go-to spot can help you get into the right mindset.

9. Research Writing Tools 

Explore various writing tools and find the ones that work best for you. Discard the rest to avoid clutter and distraction.

10. Invest in Writing Courses  

If you can, take courses that will help you improve your craft. Courses are now made into digestible sections, covering an important segment of writing in elucidating details, which saves you the hassle of paying high figures for a course.

Lastly, go easy on yourself 

Understand that some days will be unproductive, and others will exceed your expectations. This doesn't make you any less of a writer. Love yourself for what you do, appreciate your work for what it is, and value your effort no matter the outcome. You need to love your work first before others will.

♥♥♥♥♥♥

Happy new year fams 🥳🌹

[brittanyearnestauthor]

The Importance of Finding Your Own Unique Voice in Writing

Finding your own voice as a writer is crucial. It's what sets you apart from other writers and establishes the tone of your work. Your voice helps readers determine if your stories or content are right for them, fostering a loyal audience who resonates with your authenticity.

What Does Having a Unique Voice Mean?

Having a unique voice means writing with your own set of values, beliefs, and personality. However, as a writer, you must shape these traits into stories that are both entertaining and insightful. Your unique voice allows you to create stories that you find meaningful and tell them in a way that best reflects your values, beliefs, and personality. This gives your work its distinct spin.

For example, if you give any writer a writing prompt, each writer will put their own spin on it based on their unique voice and style. One writer might infuse humor, while another might focus on deep emotional connections. This variation is what makes each piece of writing special and engaging.

How Does Your Unique Voice Shape Your Writing?

Your unique voice infuses personal meaning into your writing. It allows you to tell stories that matter to you, imbued with your personal insights and experiences. This not only makes your stories authentic but also allows readers to connect with you on a deeper level.

1. Infusing Personal Values and Beliefs: Your voice is an extension of your core values and beliefs. For instance, if you value resilience, your stories might feature characters overcoming significant obstacles, showcasing life lessons around perseverance.

2. Showcasing Personality: Your personality naturally seeps into your writing, adding a personal touch. Whether you're witty, serious, or reflective, these traits make your stories engaging and relatable.

3. Creating Meaningful Scenarios: By sharing personal experiences or valuable lessons through your stories, you can deeply impact readers, helping them navigate their own challenges.

Why is Finding Your Unique Voice Important?

1. Sets You Apart: Your unique voice differentiates you from other writers. It's your signature style that readers can recognize and connect with.

2. Establishes Expectations: Your voice sets the tone for your readers, giving them a sense of what to expect from your work. This consistency helps build a loyal audience.

3. Builds a Loyal Audience: Readers resonate with authenticity. Your unique voice helps them decide if your stories or content resonate with them, fostering a dedicated following.

Conclusion

Finding your unique voice as a writer is not just about standing out—it's about creating a genuine connection with your readers. Your voice is the heart of your writing, making your stories distinctly yours. By embracing and honing your unique voice, you enhance the authenticity of your writing and forge a deeper connection with your readers.

[nanowrimo]

Smash Your Word Count Goals in 3 Easy Steps

from our sponsors at Freewrite

Here at Freewrite, we help writers reach peak productivity in order to meet word count goals and create their best work yet. That’s our reason for being.

Today, we’re going to share the three easy steps proven by science to help you reach your writing goals!

1) Set A Goal & Write It Down

The psychology of goal setting is pretty clear. It’s what NaNoWriMo is all about, right? Research has proven that people who set goals experience higher motivation and are more likely to feel accomplished.

However, the type of goal you set makes a big difference to your efforts. Make sure that your goals are (a) clear and specific, (b) realistic, and (c) measurable.

Being clear about your goal will help you hone in on what you’re trying to achieve and ignore distractions. Make sure to write it down, as well. Research by psychologist Gail Matthews has revealed that people who write down goals are 33% more successful than those who simply set a goal in their head.

Next, be realistic. This means being honest with yourself about what you can and can’t achieve based on your other life obligations. Setting goals that you can’t achieve will only lead to frustration and, ultimately, a lack of motivation.

And last, make sure each goal is measurable. “Write 1,000 words each day” is much easier to measure than “Finish this book.” Because we all know it’s difficult to measure a book being “done”!

Breaking these goals down into smaller, simpler steps will help, too. If your goal is to write 20,000 words during Camp NaNo, break that down into 5,000 words a week, and then figure out how many words you’ll have to write each day to reach those smaller goals.

2) Practice Freewriting

Freewriting is thinking. It’s as simple — and as difficult — as that.

While every writer is unique, and there is no one way to be a writer, there are similarities we all share as humans — especially humans in the modern world — that create common obstacles to doing the things we love — like reading, writing, and yes, thinking. There are the obvious external obstacles: social media, email, the internet. But there are sneaky internal obstacles, too — the main culprit being the inner critic.

As humans, we are judgmental. It’s in our DNA. Our brains are constantly assessing situations, imagining outcomes, and making decisions. It’s part of survival at a very basic level. However, that means that when we do anything, including writing, we tend to automatically assess our actions — judging our own words, tweaking and editing them as we go along. That constant evaluation not only hinders progress, it can also stop us from ever getting started. And if we do manage to sit down to write, that inner critic creates an unconscious anxiety that prevents us from experimenting and writing down our most innovative and creative — and weird! — ideas.

We’ve all heard the advice to “write now, edit later.” Or perhaps you’ve heard writers reference “the sloppy/crappy/messy first draft.” Those are just fun ways of referencing the writing method in which you separate the drafting process from the editing process. Or, what we call freewriting.

Many people haven’t written this freely since childhood, but there’s a reason this method is taught in MFA programs. Getting your thoughts down first and revising later increases productivity and yields better, more creative work because it allows you to give your brain fully to each task. It means that when you’re drafting, you’re drafting, and when you’re editing, you’re editing. There’s no context-switching or multitasking.

So, what if you gave yourself permission to write badly at first? And we don’t just mean cheesy or with glaring plot holes — we mean typos, missing words, character names replaced by big Xs because you couldn’t remember them in the moment.

The next time you draft, we challenge you to give it a try. Just let yourself go and give your thoughts and feelings over to the act of creating. Because that’s when the magic happens. 

3) Track Your Stats

OK, you’ve set measurable goals, and you’ve started drafting. What’s next?

Track your efforts!

Here at Freewrite, we’ve created a tool to automatically track important writing stats, like word count, writing days, writing streak, and more! It’s called a Postbox Profile, and it gives you a unique URL that allows you to share your stats with writing friends.

Anyone with a Postbox account — that’s anyone who writes on a Freewrite OR uses our free in-browser drafting tool, Sprinter — can create a Postbox Profile and track their stats.

👉Don’t have a Freewrite yet? No problem! We have a FREE in-browser drafting experience called Sprinter that helps you shut down distractions and make progress — and gives you access to Postbox. Start writing today absolutely FREE at sprinter.getfreewrite.com.

👉Ready to grab your own Freewrite? Our entry-level device, Alpha, is $50 off this June only! Just use code STARTWITHALPHA at checkout.

[calaisreno]

2024: Year in Review

This year I posted 14 stories, fewer than any other year, but my word count still hovers around 300k, as it has for several years.

This was my first year writing for Fandom Trumps Hate. My story, written for the very generous and lovely @LHRinchelsea, was The Disappointed Optimist's Guide to Sharing a Flat with a Madman. It was so rewarding to participate that I plan to offer a story again this year.

My favorite story I've written this year is Déjà Vu, a closing chapter for the Off Axis series. I may write more for that series, but this one is a story that brought a lot of closure for our heroes and their friends.

My second favorite: This is Family, a fill-in story for The Final Problem (S4Ep3). I combined this into a series with People We Love, an aftermath story I wrote in 2023. "Solving" The Final Problem was a very satisfying endeavour.

I had great fun writing my first Harry-centric story in October, When Harry Met Mary.

I'm closing the year with a parallel story for When We Were Young. My Heart at Your Door will finish posting in January 2025.

This was my second year doing the May Prompts event. In 2023 there were only a few of us, but this past year, it took off in a big way. I think I was tagging over 30 people with the daily prompt! As always, it was a lot of fun. This year we had a number of people writing daily limericks, an activity that has continued for the rest of 2024, and I hope will still be going strong in 2025. Thank you @Friday411 for inspiring that!

My number one project for 2025 is The Secret of Agra, a fic that I've been writing since 2020. I've called it a White Whale, but it might be more of a Frankenstein. 😆 It is finally coming together, though, and I hope to post in 2025.

I don't have any other specific writing goals for 2025. I have quite a happy writing groove, and many WIP that I hope to complete.

I'd love to hear what you are planning for 2025, if you'd like to share! Tagging:

@keirgreeneyes @meetinginsamarra @totallysilvergirl @raina-at

@7-percent @lisbeth-kk @helloliriels @copperplatebeech

@discordantwords @chriscalledmesweetie @holmesianlove

@khorazir @jrow @thegildedbee @ghostofnuggetspast

And anyone I've forgotten!

[starchilddante]

It is now my personal goal as a writer to create queer stories for all the major stereotypes

Like come on, how have we not had a gay Christmas romance? (I'd sure as hell watch cheesy hallmark Christmas movies if they were gay lmao)

Or a cliche coffee shop meeting between two lesbians?

Or two aroace royalty in an arranged marriage trying so hard for a romance to please the other until they're like oh, dang, we just realized the other is aroace, let's rule this kingdom as best friends instead

Or a transgender princess/prince who is so insecure but turns out their fairy tale lover adores them as they are?

We get the same cliches reprinted over and over with straight cisgender people and while that's fine I want to see diversity in those cliches

I want to see queer normalized

I want in every crevice, every niche because it belongs

Because we belong.

That's my dream as a writer.

[lavender-gloom]

friendly reminder to everyone that first draft just needs to exist.

it doesn’t need to be good, it just needs to be there. stories go through so many different drafts that nobody is gonna care if your first draft is a little messy.

you can’t edit and clean up something that doesn’t exist, so make it exist!

[novlr]

Top tips for setting writing goals

Setting goals is great, but making them unachievable means setting yourself up for failure. Today's post is all about strategies to set achievable goals to help keep you on track and build that writing habit.

[ettawritesnstudies]

April 2025 Goals Recap

This was a busy month for me! My fiancé and I have been scrambling to work on wedding preparations, some fun, some stressful. All our invitations got lost/delayed in the mail and so we had to track down every single guest to call, text, or email the RSVP which was a nightmare but we’re figuring out the guest list and getting the last of the details finalized now! My mental health and productivity…

[itsawritblr]

[mitternachtskopfkino]

This bitch just hit her writing goal after having a very bad mental health day. I am proud of myself!