Where do you get your ideas?
There are endless sources for ideas. It's only when you have a dry spell that the next idea seems like mirage in the desert. Avoid a dry spell with some planning ahead. Build an oasis of ideas you can always come back to, pack them away like an idea bank.
Most of your ideas will come from yourself, your experiences, reactions and feelings. So expand your experiences, think of things you haven't done yet, things you would like to learn and know more about. Go to sources of experience like museums where you can see displays of things you have only read of in books. You may not want to be a demolition driver but you can go to a demolition race and see it first hand, talk to people, wipe mud off your jacket. Seek out new experiences, you never know what you will find along the way.
Keep your mind open as well as your five senses. Don't be someone who walks with their face looking down at their feet. There is so much you miss when you keep your world so narrow and small. Some little thing could inspire you in new ways. A hundred people can pass by a weed poking up through the sidewalk or bird's nest on the ground, or a million other things. But, most people don't actually look at any of it. The smallest things can give you ideas and inspiration if you let your creative mind see them and add them to the data base of ideas, thoughts and knowledge already in your head.
Read. That's simple enough. A writer should also make notes about what they read. I even clip out articles and make my own hand written notes on them. If you find something at the library or the bookstore scribble yourself some notes or get a copy of it. A photocopy works at the library but at the bookstore you either have to write a note or snap a photo so you can read it later. (Maybe taking a photo isn't entirely ethical, but if I use the information I do give my source. I just can't afford to buy every book or magazine that catches my imagination). Keep your notes, clipped articles and other media in a Writing Folder and try to keep it organized by niche, topic or genre.
Most of this isn't new information. However, it doesn't hurt to remember to do all you can do. No writer needs to have writer's block or run dry of ideas if they keep working on a flow of ideas, experiences and knowledge.
It’s funny how things become vintage. I remember when my Aunt Alice (my Grandmother’s sister) came to visit me in the hospital and gave me my first pair of dangly earrings. They were not expensive made but they were gold and elegant looking and most of all, when I wore them I could feel them swaying just under my earlobes. It meant a lot to me.
Now here we are, about 30 years later, I still have those earrings tucked away in my jewelry box with all the other stuff I don’t wear. (I never became the girly type to wear make up or jewelry). Now those earrings could be called vintage. It makes me feel older than I really am. My Aunt Alice isn’t here any longer. I miss her but I do think about that day now and then, and many others.
Do you have a special pair of earrings or something other jewelry? Is there something in your jewel box that makes you remember someone else, especially a family member? Even though my earrings aren’t especially valuable I would like to have someone in the family to give them to. It’s a shame that none of the younger generation in the family now will have any memory of my Aunt Alice. So the earrings will never be special to them in the same way they are special to me. That’s kind of sad.
Hint Fiction, The Film
You have a camera.
You have a crew.
You have actors.
You have 25 words.
You have 1 minute.
Do you have what it takes?
Write and film a minute long movie based on the short stories selected on the site. Further details will appear in August when they are open for submissions.
Note - Hint fiction (n) : a story of 25 words or fewer that suggests a larger, more complex story.
It's nice to come home after being away. You might be off on a safari or just away to the grocery store. But that feeling of being home again when you walk in the door is a nice one.
My family used to have Welcome Home parties when we were a lot younger. My Dad sometimes traveled for his business. But any time one of the kids were away on a class trip, summer camp, etc. we would draw a big banner, make a cake and have a party on the day or evening they got back home again.
Can you write a poem in whatever style or length you choose, a welcome home poem. Try to write one as an ode to your home and then try to write one as if your home were welcoming you as well. How would a home welcome back it's people?
I like to pick up The Farmer's Almanac each year. I'm not a farmer, not even a heavy gardener. I just enjoy the articles, and the pictures. A few years ago we got a Canadian Almanac from the magazine, Harrowsmith Country Life. So this is the one I pick up now.
Create a personal almanac, like an inventory of your life. Make lists of ideas, people, places and things that have mattered to you at different times in your life. Keep adding information as you think of it. Basically an almanac is an annual reference book with statistics, predictions and other facts about an industry, business, country or some other person, place or thing.
Your almanac could include:
- Your areas of expertise
- Your family tree
- Memorable firsts
- Memorable lasts
- Moments of greatness
- Moments of weakness
- Jobs you have had
- Goals you have had or are working towards
- Dreams (while sleeping) and daydreams
- Things you have created or built
- School memories
- Material things that mattered to you (clothes, knickknacks, etc.)
- Unforgettable people
- Unforgettable places
- Favourite things (books, foods, people and places, etc.)
- Things you would change
- Issues that matter to you, or that you have a strong opinion about
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