If you’d like your notebook to be portable (in a shirt pocket or purse), a small notebook may be better. However, if you plan to be prolific and to fill every page with writing, a larger notebook may be more practical. If you’re notebook shopping on a budget, size will be the single factor that most determines the price—smaller notebooks, and notebooks with more flimsy covers are usually cheaper. If you plan to draw in your notebook, you may also want to find a notebook with graph-paper pages.
If you write a lot, and don’t want to constantly buy new notebooks, consider buying a three, four, or five subject notebook, so you have ample space to expand. Buying multiple notebooks will also be helpful if you want to categorize your writing into multiple subject categories.
You can also personalize the notebook by writing your name in the front, doodling pictures when you’re bored, or taping in a couple pictures of you and your friends. Your personalization doesn’t have to be messy or showy; it just needs to make the journal feel like it’s yours.
Get pictures, gems, feathers, strings, whatever you want to create your own personal writing place to escape. You can also decorate the cover of your writer’s notebook with stickers. You don’t have to do this all at once; build up a collection of stickers over time (through visiting local businesses, for example) and use them to make an appealing collage on your notebook’s cover.
Don’t worry whether or not your writing is “polished. ” Just focus on writing something that’s interesting to you and that you can keep coming back to day after day.
Plan to sit down and write after you get home from school or work. Write first thing in the morning before you tackle responsibilities for the day. Write in bed at night, before you go to sleep. Find a time that works best for you when you are relaxed and undisturbed. This may vary on a day to day basis.
Give yourself some restrictions when you write to push you out of your comfort zone and try new things. Try writing poetry. In poems, you don’t need to have characters or plots; you can write about your feelings or observations of the world around you. Read a variety of works for ideas and inspiration. When deciding what to read, plan to focus on different genres so that you can see how well-known writers use descriptive language.
Always revise your work after you’ve finished a draft, a poem, or an essay. If you don’t like what you’ve written or you think it could be better, add or remove a section, change the genre or style, or change the point of view. [3] X Research source
You’ll also receive compliments on your writing, which are encouraging and can motivate you to continue writing or to try a new style of writing. However, if you would prefer your notebook and its contents to remain private—especially if you’ve written sensitive or personal information inside—that’s fine too. If someone asks to read your notebook, you can just say, “No thank you, I’d prefer that other people not read what I’m writing in my notebook. ” Keep your notebook in a private spot in your room to prevent others from looking at it.
Write down the details right when you see them. It’s likely you’ll forget what you wanted to write the longer you wait. Note things like how a tree looks when it loses its leaves, how fresh baked foods smell, or how you feel at the end of a long day. Make notes of what you have seen in the past such as the author/artist and write any description of your inspiration in the start of the book.
You can also try this by listening to someone’s conversation on the phone. You won’t be able to hear the other side of the conversation, but that is the fun part because you can imagine what the other person is saying and incorporate that into your writing.
Try taking words you’ve already used in your writing and looking up their synonyms in a thesaurus. This will help you to use more descriptive words in your writing, making it more interesting and more detailed. It will also help you to expand your vocabulary.
If you take your journal with you everywhere you go, you’ll be able to jot down impressions, observations, or phrases that you see or overhear throughout the day.
