To start, let's begin with the most common mistake that everyone, even the greatest of writers, have trouble with. And that mortal enemy is the common comma.

As silly as it may sound, this is actually true. We all have misused this punctuation symbol at one time or another, with or without even realizing it. Because these mistakes are so common, they can even be looked over by the toughest of grammar Nazi and not be spotted.

How can we catch these little punctuation ninjas? A good way to start is by understanding what exactly are these commas for. What is there purpose? What do they do? Why do we use them? Are they really that important? Why should we care if they make our stories make sense?

Well, a comma is meant to separate the structural elements of sentences into manageable, understandable segments.

We use commas to manage our sentences orderly by chopping them up, like how you may sort things in your school binder or like how you may arrange dishes in your cabinets at home.

They are important because, without them, our sentences might look like this.

Before the ceremony began I called my friend Becky who was going to come with me to tell her that my other friend Jonny wasn't going to make it because of his band concert he had to go to in an hour.

As you can hopefully see, without commas, that sentence didn't make any sense. Instead, it should look like this:

Before the ceremony began, I called my friend Becky, who was going to come with me, to tell her that my other friend, Jonny, wasn't going to make it because of his band concert he had to go to in an hour.

Thanks to those five little helpful ninjas, that sentence can now be read properly.

The reason why we should care about using commas correctly, is so that the readers can understand what is going on, and keep up to pace with the events or emotions you're trying to express in your writing.

Now, because I'm lame, here is a link to a website that can explain the comma rules much better than I could.

https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/owlprint/607/

So much for these being my lessons, right? Haha. I hope this helps you become better writers!