How to Create a Consistent Writing Habit

[@opheliawild]

You busted me. I was avoiding writing and watching this for probably the 3rd or 4th time. LOL.

[@cwfcwfcwf]

Watching most of my KZbin channels is procrastinating but I have never thought that your videos have ever been a waste of time.

[@ammarif618]

It's pointless to mention the obvious....but I'll mention that....you're amazing... you're amazing

[@banerjeekaustav7660]

Hi Shaleen! Thanks for your genuine & enlightened tips for making a writing habit. This is the best video on writing that I have ever fortunately come across. The suggestions that you have given are realistically effective and I got hooked watching the first time only! So this is the "Hit" on the bell 🔔 for your channel in order to follow your future informative & valuable video!

[@mikalappalainen2041]

Watching your videos for ten minutes is more productive on the long run than writing for ten minutes.

[@madavi6321]

Thank you so much! This video was so useful for me!

[@copester1204]

When calling yourself out, be mindful of the words you use in your self-talk. Tell yourself, "I want to work on my story" rather than "I have to go write now". Psychologists studying how well people keep New Year's resolutions like dieting and exercise saw significant improvement when people used positive statements. "I can't eat that" or "I have to go exercise" turn it into a self-inflicted punishment. Make it an affirmation of your choice.

[@shmak952]

I have really been finding your videos helpful. So here's an issue that I've had lately that I'd love to see you make a video on: How to avoid using the same words and phrases over and over. Especially when doing dialog. Ex: "Character A speech." he said. "Character B reply." she said. "Character A continues." he said. Or maybe just a video on how to write dialog/conversations in general. To write it in a way that reads naturally.

[@bbworks159]

Shmak95 The easiest solution when writing dialog between two characters is after writing he said, she said, you don’t have to continue that repetition. Just write what they are saying and the reader would know it’s the same two characters talking back and forth.

[@shmak952]

@@bbworks159 True. However with me I describe a lot of body language and voice inflection in between the dialog. For example: "I'm confused." the tall man said, cocking an eyebrow, "What do you mean?" "Well," the short man pondered, scratching his head, "I guess I mean this sounds redundant." "Impossible!" the tall man stood from his chair. "No." the short man leaned in, pulling the other man back to the table by the sleeve, "Inevitable." You see what I mean? If this conversation were to go on for a page or so, it'd get old saying tall man/short man (or simply the character's names) over and over. And if I want to describe the body language I have to dip in and out of the actual dialog a bunch and the result can feel unnatural in an extended conversation between two characters. I try to have multiple ways to refer to a character in order to mix it up but sometimes I run out. Maybe it's just me being dumb but if anybody else has had this problem I'd love any tips.

[@bbworks159]

Shmak95 Hmm? Just my opinion, of course but my suggestion is you either not write dialog that way, or space the conversation out in a way that you can describe in further detail the characters mannerisms. Your example was too brief. “the short man pondered” is more than enough unless scratching his head leads to something more. Why did the tall man stand from his chair? Was it to point his finger at the short man? Those are things you may want to think about. Otherwise it may be best to avoid the descriptions entirely as they may not add anything to story and you always want to avoid fluff.

[@shmak952]

@@bbworks159 Dang that's a good point. I'll start asking myself that. Thanks!

[@Loseirdo]

This isn't directly related to what you were saying, but I wanted to point out that your punctuation and capitalization is all wrong. If you're continuing a sentence past the end of a line of dialogue, end it with a comma, not a period. "This is what it would look like," I wrote as an example. On the other hand, if you're separating a single line of dialogue into two lines/clauses with prose in between them, the second line should not start with a capital letter. "It would be something like this," I commented, "if that makes sense." Write it the way it would appear if you hadn't inserted the break: "It would be something like this, if that makes sense." Stylistically, it's a bad idea to use a long description or multiple clauses to break up a single line of dialogue, because it very badly distorts the flow of the dialogue itself. If you really want to use more than one clause or sentence in between lines of dialogue, close them out and separate them accordingly. "This is getting complicated," I muttered to myself, trying to simplify the explanation as much as possible. "Even for me." Closing the prose with a full stop and starting the next line of dialogue with a capital letter reads much better than trying to string everything together into one long, unbroken thought. But this is up to your personal taste and style, so don't take it as gospel truth. I just thought I'd share my own experience with it, since I write this way a lot.

[@musicaddict1178]

I honestly just want to be able to write small stories on my new notebook. I don’t know what to write in it. So I came up with this idea.

[@hatezis]

Great advices, especially the "don't fight it" part is something you don't hear everyday :)

[@booksandauthorsindependenttv]

Shalin, please do a video on chapter beats and how they shape chapters? 🙏🙏😊💖 I'm not talking about plot beats as in milestones, Save the Cat, no. I'm talking about how one breaks down chapters with beats and how many seats do you think should be in a chapter. Thank you

[@howtoschizophrenia2606]

I would say that depends on your specific stories DNA. Not an overall one size fits all solution. What I would advice is to look at plot structure formulas, (Don't follow them slavishly but do your own thing, and if you're not into outlining wait until the edit to do those things) at the same time i would combine a plot structure with your specific genre, and figure out if you wanna write something fast paced or more slow build up. There are a ton of ways to do this, and remember it must fit your specific needs for your story... including but not limited to: Genre. Your skills. Your weaknesses. How you structure scenes What your overall length of the story should be (in adhering to SOME genre conventions or the plot structure you are using) If your 1st act is lets say 20k words. Then your 2nd act needs to be very close to that length (generally there are always exceptions to your story needs) And the same for 3rd act (depending on the act structure there will probably be more acts than that, but still its a good measuring system) The reason you wanna do this is to have consistent pacing throughout the story, and also to avoid too much inbalance in the script caused by a sagging middle, or an untight script. Hope you can use this information! :)

[@1ktales]

You know, your hair is different in a lot of the videos -- since I've been watching things you filmed over the course of several years all back-to-back -- but I think this is the first time I've seen this look. It's really cool. As for writing habits, I'm very much in the write every day camp and I slot a particular time each day as my protected time... but because I need to ramp up my writing since I've starting to hit a slowdown with my current book, and having a harder time hitting my daily goals (partly because I'm trying to adjust my style, which involves finding ways around the things I normally do). It's tough, though, because I'm going from easily writing 3k+ words per day in 2-3 hours to sometimes not getting there with 4 hours. Given how much my speed had improved with my last book (and, up until now, each book I've been able to write faster and for longer periods), it's hard to see this as anything but backsliding. And I also realized I have to go with daily goals because weekly and monthly goals lead to larger-scale procrastination where I save too much towards the end, which leads to discouragement. Of course, the one thing I really need to get in the habit of doing is revision, since I'll finish a draft in weeks then months later I still haven't revised some things.

[@sripradhamp1036]

These are great! Thank you so much for the valuable tips.

[@itsruminator]

loved it

[@devanshigupta7567]

5:28 stop personally attacking me gawd

[@ExploreImagineDefineCreate]

Please do a video on writing an adventure story. Many videos and blogs and such cover action and the generic hero's journey, but not actual adventure story writing. Please and thank you.

[@baninrahimi5091]

Very helpful 😊😊🙏

[@juliesit5344]

I’m restarting my first novel because the first time I tried the pantser style. That didn’t work because I got to where I didn’t know what should come next. I’m going to do it this by the 3 Act story structure. But I have a question. What if I have more scenes or chapters between the plot points? Or am I suppose to? I’m new to this. Please help.

[@mageprometheus]

I love practising the piano and bass and composing music. I have these as my top 3 priorities with writing in 4th place. Procrastination kicks in and I end up writing. It's sad my willpower is so weak I need to play mind games with my inner child.

[@sovietta133]

Shaelin Shaelin Shaelin, the world needs to know you exist. That’s all I’m gonna say.

[@sumayyahkhan8897]

Can you please do a video on how to write an adventure story

[@ExploreImagineDefineCreate]

THIS, surprisingly not many videos cover this. They cover action, and the generic "heroes journey," but not actually Adventure story crafting

[@juliesit5344]

Question? I’m trying to write my first romance novel and I have a question. My very wealthy heroine has a problem that she needs to solve which will last the whole novel her solving it. She has an antagonist who doesn’t want her to solve it. Also she needs help solving it which is where a love interest comes in because she would never be around love interest otherwise. There is also another antagonist to the love relationship. What is the trope, the character arc, and can a story have a romantic plot and a story plot? It gets VERY confusing!!!

[@Reskareth]

How do you write everyday if you're not actually writing but rather plotting the story? I wanna work more on my project, but I'm not done plotting it, so how do you actively plot your book?

[@pootprancia1956]

I only have 2 hours a day to write. It's hard for me, since I am a Filipino and English is not my first language. Above all, I have only been teaching myself with English. For two hours, I can only create two to three paragraphs.

[@ahmeds.mansour1293]

So beautiful, you are!

[@bbworks159]

I unfortunately found that I CANT write at all without my ritual and that is a real problem for me.

[@milestrombley1466]

I usually keep writing till I reach a certain amount of words, but it can give me a headache.

[@parashthakur6776]

It seems like you have taken this info from atomic habit😅😅

[@theravendeskwriter5910]

Eh, some good advice, some bad. Honestly though, you should never shame yourself for not writing. Saying "I could be writing right now" is an immediate wrist slap and it builds a bad association with writing. I used to do that constantly and it made me just hate writing for a while. I couldn't enjoy anything else without the constant nagging thought of "I should be writing". Then I would sit down to write and feel guilty for neglecting everything else. I would think "I should be cleaning the house right now" or "I should be running those errands". When you associate any passion with guilt, it spoils it.

[@pugjuice8462]

It depends on the person. I can think, "I could be writing," and not feel ashamed. It's like taking a mental note. For sure there are others who do feel shame like you did, but that's not an excuse to call something bad advice based on not working for you.

[@suddalavijay6930]

I left the video at 6:08 lol