Writers’ brains are a complex array of thoughts, impressions, and feelings that want to be expressed, that sometimes demand to be expressed. Most of the time ideas are plentiful, words are flowing, life is good.
And then, without warning, that same brain goes completely silent.
In those moments of silence, we want to be writing flowing prose or quirky poems, but our minds are asking, “Whut r words?” as if we’ve never had a complete thought in our life.
In those moments, we may need to take a breath and allow our brains to re-charge. We may just need to collect ideas to store for later.
Where do we find ideas?
We find ideas in random bits of information that bounce around and won’t leave us alone. Not everyone experiences this, so let me assure you that if you have an idea that won’t let go until you do something with it, you are a writer.
Tricia Goyer, author of From Dust and Ashes, was on a trip with friends in Austria when she heard about the liberation of the Gusen and Mauthausen concentration camps on May 5,1945. This historical account would not leave her alone and she turned it into a beautiful story of redemption and forgiveness.
When he was 16 years old, C. S. Lewis had the image of a fawn carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. When he was 40 he wrote a story around that image, which became Mr. Tumnus in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.
Like I said, these thoughts demand to be expressed, no matter how long it takes.
Being curious is a great place to find ideas.
Ask why. Get curious about human nature, curious about the way society works, curious about the rules that the HOA in your neighborhood chooses to enforce. Channel your inner toddler and ask “Why?” over and over. Unlike the toddler, though, look at your answers and go deeper with each why.
Example: Why do people do the things they do? Why do people stay in toxic relationships? Why can’t they let go? Why do they ignore some red flags but not others?
The first paragraph of Divergent takes something as simple as looking into a mirror, an action we do without thinking, and makes it a once-a-year event. Every sentence in that first paragraph makes the reader ask why and that keeps the reader reading.
Ask What would happen if….What would happen if a western took place in space? What would happen if your main character tripped in front of the protagonist of the story? What would happen if your pet fought crime while you were at work?
Ideas are waiting for us in our own imagination. A terrifying fever-induced nightmare gave James Cameron the visual for Terminator, while real world current events shaped the story.
Ideas pop out at us from the things we read. Brandon Mull was fascinated by the wardrobe in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. This led him to develop his own portal fantasy series, Five Kingdoms, where the portal is a spooky neighborhood haunted house on Halloween.
The local News is filled with potential ideas. Sometimes life really is stranger than fiction. Watch the news with a pen in hand or keep a file of headlines that fascinate (or perplex) you. Here are a few headlines from my current file. They may be true. They may be fake news. Either way, they are filled with ideas.
- Man arrested after posing as a museum tour guide and inventing entire fake histories for every painting.
- Charlie Chaplin was kidnapped twice – but he was alive for only one of them.
- On September 3,1967 Sweden switched from driving on the left side of the road to the right side. Recipe for chaos?
- Police chase involving a stolen hearse and a Dollar General.
- An aggressive water buffalo on the loose and prowling the streets of Iowa.
Pay attention to what is going on around you. Look at it from a writer’s perspective. Writers notice things that other people miss. I wrote a short story inspired by a man completely losing it in front of his kids at a hockey game. The story was about a kid on a hockey team. What happens when the lines get blurred between doing your best and doing whatever it takes to win?
We don’t live or write in a vacuum. We walk through each day surrounded by current events, things that don’t make sense and a healthy dose of curiosity. Some people complain and others debate. Writers can use this combination as fuel for their imagination.
6 Things to do If you are stuck in no-idea land
Do something different. Drive a different way to work. Go to a different coffee shop to write. Write in a different spot in your house.
Look up writing prompts. A random writing prompt can get your mind moving in a different direction. It may end up being a way to fill a blank page or it may become the idea for a new scene in your current work in progress.
Watch the local news or read a local newspaper with a pen in hand. I’d love to see a list of headlines after a week of doing this. Seriously, send it to me!
Ask What would happen if…about something random. What if gravity only worked on Wednesdays? What if gravity only worked on some people? What if gravity was sporadic, like the geysers at Yellowstone?
Give Yourself Permission to Slow Down. Our brains can’t be creative if we are going full speed ahead with no moments of quiet to think. Walking helps me. The motion of walking helps my mind relax and the ideas start flowing.
View yourself as a collector. Ideas can come from anywhere – a random quote, an unusual turn of phrase in the middle of a conversation, the name of a coffee drink at your favorite coffee shop, and,apparently, even a fever-induced nightmare. Become a collector of ideas. Write them down as they come to you. Create a note on your phone where you write down ideas as they come. Then when you feel stuck, you have ideas that might get you going again.
You don’t have to do anything with them. If they are meant to become something, they will start bugging you until you do something with them – even if it takes over 20 years.
Erin Ulerich enjoys encouraging other writers on Space to Create Writing Life and at the annual Space to Create Writing Retreats she hosts with her team in French Camp, MS. Her debut YA Christian Fantasy novel, Angkura: Hesed, releases November 7.
moment for me.
