6 (more) Ways to Write More

Advice is never one size fits all, so this post is a follow-up to an earlier one: 5 Ways to Write More. While the best way to write more is to do just that, having the drive to keep going, even if it’s in a haphazard, disorganised way, can be more important than the writing itself. In the hopes of helping you find something that might work for you, here are 6 more ways to write more:

1. Make Writing a Priority

The first step to successfully writing more is reminding yourself that while writing may not be your job, and potentially not even your primary hobby, you want it to be a priority. Writing is time-consuming and it can take up a lot of brain space, but if you aren’t trying to translate your desire to write into getting words on a page, you may not be happy with your progress.

Admitting to yourself that writing is important to you can be a very useful step in raising writing in your list of priorities and helping you to ensure you find ways to write more often. As a result of prioritising writing, making sure it’s something you actively do, you will likely write a lot more than you previously did.

2. Have Goals

Whether these goals are strict or loose, having just one or a few can keep you on track and help you to write more. Maybe you make a goal to sit down to write at least once every week for a year, or to write 500 words every day, or even just to write more often. Any goal can be a great way to keep yourself motivated and give you direction.

A huge part of writing more is feeling like you have a certain degree of control over when and how you write so that you can see progress being made. Seeing progress will encourage more progress. Hitting these goals can be a great way to demonstrate to yourself that you are capable of doing so, and even if they seem like very small achievements, it can definitely keep you motivated and help you write more.

3. Reward Yourself

Don’t be afraid to celebrate writing milestones by doing something you enjoy, even if both the milestones and the rewards seem insignificant. For a lot of people, just writing that first sentence on a blank page can be a huge step that deserves some kind of reward, for others, it will be finishing a chapter or hitting a certain word count. Whether the reward is watching your favourite show only after you’ve written for half an hour or scrolling through social media once you’ve hit 1,000 words, you should find something that you want to do but that might interfere with your writing if you don’t manage your time correctly. Try to avoid things that might be unhealthy or that you make come to rely too heavily on.

You can reward yourself whenever you think it’s appropriate, just remember not to get too carried away. You want whatever reward you employ to help motivate you, to keep your morale up, and to encourage you to keep writing. What you don’t want is to use the reward as an excuse to barely write anything and continuously treat yourself, as that will defeat the purpose of rewarding yourself at all.

4. Consider Alternative Forms of Writing

If typing up your words is not working for you, it might be worth trying to either write your project by hand or dictate it into the appropriate software. Many people swear by these methods and struggle when faced with a blank page, a blinking cursor, and their internal monologue. If you have any doubts that typing may not be the thing for you, give an alternative form of getting your story down and you might just find that it gives you the push you need to ‘write’ more.

5. Read More

A large part of writing, or even why we write in the first place, is being inspired. Reading more will help you with exactly that but also contribute to your bank of ideas and interests and help you fine-tune your knowledge of what a good piece of writing looks like. If you don’t have the money for a writing course, or any access to one, reading critically is a great way to learn how to write.

Reading more will also help with your concentration and can be great for researching if you’re reading in the genre you like to write in. The only thing you want to be careful of is subconsciously (or consciously) lifting phrases or ideas directly from what you read, as you should avoid this at all costs. You read to be inspired, not to steal.

6. Write Whenever you Can

This is likely the most important piece of advice for writing more. Whilst planning, scheduling and having goals can be an excellent way to make sure you write more, it won’t work for everyone and it most certainly won’t work all the time. Our lives are hectic, unpredictable, and ever-changing, and so our writing should account for that if we want to do it more.

What you can try to do whether you schedule your writing time or not, is to write whenever you have spare time. Whether you’re on the tube, waiting for something to cook in the oven, or on a lunch break at work, look for the times in your day when you’re not doing much of anything or you are waiting for something to happen, and write. Write in every snatch of time that you have. If that means you need to write on your phone, or in a small notebook, consider doing it, as you will find that these 5-10 minute bursts of writing add up to quite a few words and do not add any extra pressure to your day.

Always remember that as long as you are writing, it’s okay if you don’t match the speed of other writers in your field or organise your writing in the same way, so long as you’re always making progress. I hope at least one of these 6 methods helps you to consistently write a little more and eventually reach your writing goals. Thanks for reading!