Archive for ideas
Apr 24, 2008 at 10:47 pm · Filed under creativity, ideas, writer's block, writing and tagged: creativity, ideas, writer's block, writing
Are you only coming up with bad ideas?
That’s okay–write them down. Getting those bad ideas out of your head and recorded on paper will leave you free to rework them, or to come up with fresh new ideas. Forcing yourself to hold an idea in the back of your mind can restrict your ability to think of new, random ideas which might work better for you. You’ll also have those bad ideas for reference–and they might look better on paper, too.
Apr 2, 2008 at 12:00 pm · Filed under Candy Chang, creativity, ideas, Sidewalk Psychiatry, writing and tagged: Candy Chang, creativity, ideas, Sidewalk Psychiatry, writing
Browsing around the internet yesterday I came across this: Candy Chang – Public Art – Sidewalk Psychiatry
“A routine trip can prompt reflections on everything from future goals to last night’s dinner conversation. As people sacrifice personal time for hectic schedules, these casual occasions for reflection become all the more important.”
The little messages encourage introspection, hopefully coming at an appropriate time for the passers-by (or maybe inappropriate, if you’re looking for humor). Are you asking yourself the right questions about your story, plot, and characters? Are you dancing around the things you really want to ask?
One good question–the right question–can inspire tired work, or shed light on something about your characters or plot that wasn’t clear to you before. If what you want to ask yourself or your characters is eluding you, try to think about and write down questions as if you were making notes about someone else’s work. Then give them to yourself, and pretend someone else gave you that note.
Mar 25, 2008 at 11:34 am · Filed under characters, creativity, dialogue, ideas, writing and tagged: characters, creativity, dialogue, ideas, personalities, writing
Oh, Onion writers, you are so full of funny!
Dear reader, enjoy these two old, uh, “news” stories first:
It’s Not Nice To Be Smarter Than Other People
Nation Afraid To Admit 9-Year-Old Disabled Poet Really Bad
Do you change what you say to others because of:
- fear?
- anger?
- peer pressure?
- pressure from your boss?
- their inability to understand?
- the fact that you want to play a joke on them?
- the fact that you believe the rumors about them?
- the fact that they helped you once?
- your best friend’s opinion of them?
- desire for friendship?
- desire for love?
Do your characters? Shouldn’t they?
Feb 26, 2008 at 12:00 am · Filed under creativity, David Wahl, ideas, Publishing/Craft, writing and tagged: craft, creativity, David Wahl, generating ideas, ideas, writing
Instead of using their great ideas as they have them, people squirrel them away and store them on an idea shelf in their heads where they gather dust… But, we know that’s wrong. The truth is that as soon as you use your best idea, you come up with a better idea… Even writing an idea down in a notebook will let you come up with a new idea.
He’s dead on. For several reasons. Generating ideas–by itself–is a great way to sort out some of the bad ones so you can focus on the ones that shine. It also keeps your mind churning up better solutions to the problems you generate in your work in progress.
Recently, in my WIP for youngsters, I was faced with two characters meeting in a way that I hated. I wanted it to be funny, and the old “pet is lost and needs to be found” encounter just wasn’t accomplishing anything for me. It wasn’t conducive to funny. It’s a sad situation, in fact, to lose a pet (even for a short time), and that’s really hard to turn around to make humorous. So I wrote down that bad idea. And I came up with a much better way–a very silly way–for the two to meet, and it’s working out well.
From the broader standpoint of creating a series of books, I’ve read several lit agents’ blogs that warn against writing an entire series that will never be sold. The general advice (for us new, unwashed masses, anyway) seems to be to write work that can be built upon if the series catches on, but which stands on its own. That’s a good point. Consider that you do only sell the first one…what were you saving those great ideas for? Plus, even if you sell the whole series, later books will have your characters in new places as they change and grow–in state of mind, if not locale. So the ideas you have been “saving” may not even be as funny or exciting by the time you get to them. Or they may not work at all.
If the book doesn’t sell, no one will see your great ideas, anyway. Give each story its best chance to succeed: Stuff your work full!
Ansley Asher 