Organization

One of the most important things I've found for a story writer, such as novels or short stories, is organization. It is very important that all your ideas for one story stay together. I know I have the habit of writing down ideas for world building or personality traits on anything nearby. Some of my ideas have been in small notepads while others have been in up to three or four different notebooks. I often have troubles remembering which notebook is my primary one and sometimes have to search through my whole drawer and desk to find that idea I had last month that would be perfect in this place in the story. My strong recommendation is to take some time at the end of each day to make sure each idea you had that day got put in its proper notebook or place so you won't have to search for it and ruin your motivation.