Seems Like The Silliest Question Ever But Every Idea I Have Seems So Unoriginal. Do You Tips Or Exercises

Seems like the silliest question ever but every idea I have seems so unoriginal. Do you tips or exercises to get the creativity going?

Getting the creative juices flowing…

I do! I have plenty of pep-talks and resources for this sort of thing, so I’ve organized them here by method (prompts/playlists/advice/inspiration/etc)

Articles

Coming Up With Scene Ideas

Coming Up With “Original” Ideas

How To Turn A Good Idea Into A Good Story

How To Motivate Yourself To Write

Reasons To Improve Your Lifestyle

Tips & Advice for Aspiring Authors, Writers, and Poets

Healthy Forms of Motivation

How To Have A Productive Mindset

How To Fall In Love With Writing

Writing Through Mental Health Struggles

Why “Burnout” Is Oay - The Creative Cycle

How To Actually Get Writing Done

Playlists

Things To Listen To When You’re Working

Classical & Instrumental

Ambient

Sad Scenes

Chase Scenes

Epic Scenes

Fight Scenes

Angst Scenes

Fun Montage Scenes

Climax Scenes

Calm Scenes

Resolution Scenes

Romantic Scenes

Action Scenes

Science Fiction

Our Day Will Come

Contemporary Poetry

MORE

Prompts, Prompt Lists, & Writing Challenges

Dark Quotes & Prompts

Challenges For Different Types of Writers | Part II

Angst Prompts

31 Days of Prompts : January 2018 Writing Challenge

20 Sentence Story Prompt

Dramatic Prompts

Suspenseful Prompts

Sad Prompts

Romantic Prompts

31 Days of Horror : October 2019 Writing Challenge

31 Days of Fantasy - December 2020 Writing Challenge

Fake Relationship Alternate Universe Prompts

Assassin Alternate Universe Prompts

Soulmates Alternate Universe Prompts

Advice & Pep-Talks

Restarting Your Writing Passion

On Hating Your Old Stuff

Depression As An Inhibitor

Dear Writers Who Are Hesitant To Start Writing

“All First Drafts Are Crap” – My Thoughts

Getting Back To Writing After A Long Hiatus

Wanting To Finish A Story You’ve Fallen Out of Love With

Getting Motivated To Write

Getting Burnt Out Near The Finish Line

–

Masterlist | WIP Blog

If you enjoy my blog and wish for it to continue being updated frequently and for me to continue putting my energy toward answering your questions, please consider Buying Me A Coffee, or pledging your support on Patreon, where I offer early access and exclusive benefits for only $5/month.

Overcoming Writer's Block

Write the bits you enjoy first

You enjoy writing the action, the environment the introspection? Go for it! Get that gold written down.

I really enjoy writing dialogue, my draft chapters read like a play with the thoughts and descriptive sections added in later.

Skip ahead to the parts of the story that excite you

This, this, this.

Stuck on a transition chapter? Skip ahead to one of the dramatic/fluffy/nsfw parts of the story that you have been head-cannoning about from the start. Not only will it keep you writing, it may remind you to include any foreshadowing you had in mind for earlier chapters and when you eventually get to your pre-drafted chapter you will love your past self when it's already half written.

Get in the right frame of mind

Put your playlist on, spend time visualising, look at the picture or prompt that inspired you. Whatever drives your muse reconnect with it and begin jotting your ideas down once more

Take a break

Sometimes a cup of tea will do it, other times you need a day. On occasion I've taken a week or more off just to breathe and recharge the batteries.

Look after yourself first.

It can be hard if you have frequent commentors or people really eagerly following your story, the pressure whether self inflicted or from external influences is real. But everyone else can wait. You write for you first, when and if you decide to share your work rest assured we'll all still be here cheering you on.

Xxx

On Writing for Yourself and Not for Notes

AKA How to Enjoy Writing for the Sake of it

Get off social media! I know it’s tempting to blabber on about a WIP to get those hella cool notes, but doing so only reinforces that writing’s only fun if it gets you attention. We all need that boost now and again, but too much of it will whittle away your self-reliance. Close your laptop, leave your phone in a different room, and sit down with a notebook if possible and if you need to. You’ll get to know what enthralls you personally about your story.

Don’t write for an audience for now. Tumblr likes to do this thing where it says “blah blah blah X is problematic in media” and while it’s well-intentioned, internalizing too much of this can make you feel like you’re trying to write through a maze and constantly failing at it. Forget about your audience–you can flag and catch problematic stuff in edits after tossing it to the betas.

Remember what made thirteen-year-old you lose their mind? Yeah, write that. Once you’ve let go of writing for an audience, you won’t worry about being “cringey” anymore, and that’s when things start to get real good and real fun. You don’t have to show your writing to anyone, or even tell them you wrote it, so just go buckwild! Trust me, it’s so liberating.

Your inner critic is useful–but not now. Shut that bitch up! Your job when drafting is to make something. If you did that, you win, so your critic’s opinion is worth squat here. However, if you try to fight her {I always envision mine as some bitchy middle-aged woman lol} she’s just gonna get louder. So tell yourself you can be as critical of your writing as you want during edits. You’re not working for perfect, or even good right now. You’re working for existing.

Remember that this is a process. Companies like tumblr are investing a BUNCH of cash into getting you to stay glued to their platforms, and if you’re a creator this might manifest in your feeling like you need to live your creative life online. You don’t. But retraining your brain isn’t easy. Remember that divorcing yourself from the validation of online noise takes work and time and a lot of discomfort and redirecting, especially for folks like me who thrive on routine. And don’t discipline. Redirect. Negativity has no right to be in your creative space ♥️

Concept: an apocalyptic or post apocalyptic tv show centred on a group of disabled protagonists

Must include:

-enough details about how they survive that no one can call it “unrealistic”

-mental and physical disabilities 

-a character who isn’t necessarily contributing to the survival of the group, but is not abandoned or looked down upon

-at least one character whose disability is actually less of a problem for them now that the world is ending/ended (example: autistic character who used to be constantly overstimulated but no longer is)

Optional features:

-abled person says “the only disability in life is a bad attitude” and gets told where to stuff it

-creatively weaponized mobility aids/assistive devices

-character who abled people think isn’t worth helping because of their disability, but actually has at least one skill essential to the survival of the group

-every time an abled person says something ignorant, all present disabled people look into the camera like they’re on the office 

My collection of clothing references for writing. 

What I learned from Dan Browns Free MasterClass Session

Check out the full video on Youtube.

“If you can sit down and write, you’re nowhere near the end of your ability. […] I wasn’t born knowing this [writing] I learned it by making mistakes, reading writers who do it much better than I do and saying, wow I love the way they do that, I want to pull that into what I do.”

– Dan Brown

“Protect the process and the results will take care of themselves”: Writing is 90% routine and just 10% inspiration – a marathon, not a sprint! Create a space in which you can be creative.

“Make it important to yourself”: Writing has to be a project, a priority which importance you have to enforce with yourself and your surroundings. And sometimes that’s hard and uncomfortable.

“every story has been told”: We know the hero will safe the day, but it’s all about how things happen! You get a template on which you can apply your creativitiy and voice.

“be honest with your reader”: creative liberties are alright (e.g. in historical fiction), but you have to be upfront with your reader about what is accurate according to your research and what is your creativity.

“the three C’s” for great stories: clock (time pressure, e.g. a time bomb), crucible (a box that encloses the action, restrain characters and make them face their demons, e.g. a sinking boat), contract (every page should be a promise to the reader: “I know something you don’t know and if you turn the page I promise I will tell you”).

“sticking to the right POV let’s you play fair with the reader in withholding information”: omniscient narrators owe it to the reader to spill a secret the POV character knows – if somebody has a secret that shouldn’t be told yet, stick to another POV

“whichever character has the most to loose, that’s the one you write from”: whoever is the most emotionally stimulated, just found out something upsetting or is in danger, tends to be the most interesting POV.

“I wanna do this better tomorrow”: If something doesn’t work out at first, come back later and give it more creativity, tell yourself that you can make it better to stay motivated, take it as a challenge!

“The way you spark creativity is to empty your mind”: meditation, taking a walk in nature, turn of television/smartphone, whatever let’s you be blank, your mind doesn’t like to be empty, so it will make something to fill itself up.

“Setting the table for breakfast”: Before you end your writing session, start the first paragraph for the next session – it will keep you from going back and being stuck on the last things you wrote.

“You always want people looking in the wrong direction”: Never underestimate your reader! They can tell that the person the author is shining a spotlight on is the red herring. Create a second red herring character on the sidelines who the reader could pick up on as the villain.

“The Michaelangelo way of writing”: At the first stage of writing start with many clues, make sure all the information is there. You can take unnecessary or overdone clues away during editing. It’s easier to take things away than it is to add them.

“I’m always trying to get out of a scene before it’s over”: rather than wraping everything up in a nice bow – get out before the bow is tied. A later chapter can tie up the bow of something that happened a few chapters back! You’re simultaneously solving a problem and posing a new problem. Introduce and answer questions as you go to keep things satisfying. It’s all about tension and release.