>>712840649
>I'm trying not to trace because I've been told it's not a good habit in the long run
good forward thinking, but don't think of it so much as tracing here. think of it more like practicing lines and curves, not unlike doing line and circle drills just to train your dexterity.
It seems like you've started somewhat recently so you just need to practice more by any means to develop the drawing muscles at this point. drawing like we do is completely unnatural and these muscles don't move the way we want them to until we train them properly!

also if you're using a normal school-taught handwriting grip, try to explore others. Finding the one that worked for me was like night and day for curves