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Monthly Archives: January 2015
MLP Funday – The Sorting Hat hits Ponyville
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Saturday Einstein! – Persistence is not useless
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“Them’s Writing Words!”: 3 ways to gain inspiration for your next writing project
This article was originally published on Bookmarketingtools.com
Writing Inspiration
Have you ever been in a conversation with someone and they say something that sparks a story idea in your head?
(…then you miss the rest of the conversation because you are desperately trying to imprint the idea in your brain so you can get it down on paper at a later time…)
This tends to happen a lot to me and usually I can’t get to a piece of paper (or my phone) in time to get the idea, and the emotion behind it, down.
(…immediately grabbing your phone in mid-conversation can be seen as a little rude…)
I call this phenomenon ‘Writing Words’ – When you hear something that immediately sends your mind racing on story ideas and concepts. Many good books have been sparked into existence by a word or line in a conversation, or even from a song or a picture. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is a good example of this:
“The Lion all began with a picture of a Faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. This picture had been in my mind since I was about sixteen. Then one day, when I was about forty, I said to myself: ‘Let’s try to make a story about it.”– From the essay, It All Began with a Picture, by C.S. Lewis
3 Ways To Get Writing Inspiration
Here are 3 ways that you can get inspiration, or tap into those ‘Writing Words’:
- From items and things in the world around you. Pictures, scenes, landscapes, songs, your favorite park bench…these can all be a catalyst for forming your next writing project. It’s just up to you to be aware of what is around you and see the potential. Just as C.S. Lewis did.
- From news articles. Newspapers, magazine articles, online news sites and television have always been a good source for soaking up story ideas. A social issue on illegal immigration in the Australian Press is what sparked the inspiration for my book The Enclave. Though whatever idea or theme attracts your attention, it needs to resonate with you, because if it doesn’t, the story will not have the emotional power behind it that you would like it to have.
- From the conversations and events that happen around you. Now we are back to where I started this article. Any conversation, whether one you’re involved with or overheard, can be a goldmine of ideas for stories in any genre. It’s just up you, the writer, to see their value and greedily use it to your writing advantage.
I gather ideas mainly using the 3 points above. Because of this I have a large collection of paper slips that get tucked into my idea book when I get home. I have been storing my ideas like this for years and have several notebooks full of stuff that I go back to when I need writing inspiration.
How do you find your ideas? Please share your thoughts in the comment’s section. I really would like to know what works for you.
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MLP Funday!
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Saturday Einstein – Now 20% Cooler
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Nobody Tells Harry Anything…..
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Rules for Cats who have a House to Run
Here is something else that I have to share with everyone – this is for all you cat lovers out there 🙂
DOORS
Do not allow closed doors in any room. To get a door opened, stand on hind legs and scratch the frame. You may also reach under the door and pull clothing towards you; silks get the quickest reaction.
Once door is opened, it is not necessary to use it. After you have ordered an “outside” door opened, stand halfway in and out and think about several things. This is particularly important during very cold weather, when it’s raining or snowing, or during the height of the mosquito season. Swinging doors must be avoided at all costs.
CHAIRS AND RUGS
If you have to urp, get to an overstuffed chair quickly. If you cannot manage this in time, get to an Oriental rug. If there are no Oriental rugs, shag is a good substitute. When urping on shag, be sure you project; it is a must that it stretches for as long as a human’s bare foot.
BATHROOMS
Always accompany guests to the bathroom. (See Rule I.) It is not necessary to do anything — just sit and stare.
HELPING
If one of your humans is engaged in some semi-closed activity and the other is idle, stay with the busy one. This is called “helping”; humans are known to refer to it as “hampering”. The following are the rules for “helping”:
- When supervising cooking, sit just behind the left heel of the cook. You cannot be seen and thereby stand a better chance of being stepped on and then picked up and comforted.
- For book readers, get in close under the chin, between eyes and book, unless you can lie across the book itself.
- For knitting projects or paperwork, lie on the work in the most appropriate manner so as to obscure as much of the work or at least the most important part. Pretend to doze, but every so often reach out and slap the pencil or knitting needles. The worker may try to distract you; ignore it. Remember, the aim is to hamper work. Embroidery and needlepoint projects make great hammocks in spite of what the humans may tell you.
- For people paying bills (monthly activity) or working on income taxes or Christmas cards (annual activity), keep in mind the aim – – to help! First, sit on the paper being worked on. When dislodged, watch sadly from the side of the table. When activity proceeds nicely, roll around on the papers, scattering them to the best of your ability. After being removed for the second time, push pens, pencils, and erasers off the table, one at a time.
- When a human is holding the newspaper in front of him/her, be sure to jump on the back of the paper. They love to jump.
WALKING
As often as possible, dart quickly and as close as possible in front of the human. Especially effective places to strike are:
- On stairs, when they have something in their arms;
- In the dark; and
- When they first get up in the morning.
This exercise helps with improving their coordination skills.
BEDTIME
Always sleep on the human at night. If there are two (or more) of you, book end the human putting off the greatest heat. They will try and squirm but your sheer numbers and inert bodies will effectively keep them pinned.
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MLP Funday
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Saturday Einstein – What are your limits?
Who sets your limits? Do you let others set them for you? Or do you determine how far you can reach and whether you go beyond your goals?
Me? I used to limit myself based on what other people told me, but now I want to see what I am actually capable of achieving. My first step towards this is becoming an Indie Author and self publisher. My next step is to see if I can earn enough from my writing to be able to make a full time gig out of it.
What limits have you set for yourself? And do you want to go beyond them? Tell me in the comments below.
Thinking about them and writing them down will help you decide what goals you set for yourself 🙂
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H.M. Clarke 