Writer's Block

Most of you know that I spend a lot of time on Yahoo Answers. I’m usually somewhere in the books & answers section answering questions. And a question I’ve seen a lot is something along the lines of “What should I write my story about?”
Now a lot of people don’t like these kind of questions. And I agree with them that if you want to write or even be a writer, that you should be able to be creative enough to think of something to write about.
I named this post “writer’s block” because a lot of people have trouble with thinking up story idea’s. Even more find it difficult to keep going once they’ve past the first twenty pages or so. Their creativity just seems to have dried out. Don’t worry, I’ve never heard of the death of someone’s creativity before. It’s just a temporary block, it’ll get back again!

Here are some tips I think may help when you have no ideas. Personally I’ve never had that problem buy these tips helped me a lot when I was having a writer’s block.

- Write in a notebook or a sheet of paper. Write about anything. This is much like the practice notebook I’ve mentioned in Practice Makes Perfect. Even if you’re writing rubbish your brain will get the message that you need a story idea and it will get creative and think of one. (This can take a while but eventually the idea’s will come)

- What inspires you? Do you have a movie list like I do of movies which makes you just want to write and gets your brain to have all kinds of crazy thoughts? Do you love paintings? Take a look on creative art sites such as Deviantart and be inspired. (Get inspired and do your own thing, don’t steal of course). Or listen to music. Listen to the lyrics and pay attention to the feeling you get when listening to it.

- People. Go outside sit down on a bench somewhere and just watch the people passing you by. Imagine who they are, what kind of work they have and where they are going. Imagine what they’re thinking right there and then. You may find yourself a character. Perhaps you’ll get the hang of creating small pieces of the world of those people and find a story idea. Even if you don’t it’s great practice. Be sure you always have a pen and some paper with you though! So that you can write your thoughts down.

And my last tip is making a mind map. Now I assume most of you know what a mind map is. For those who don’t it’s when you link a lot of words to a key word or an idea. It’s great for getting new ideas for your story.

Step one: Think of the gengre that you love. For instance fantasy.

Step two: Pick a word that is related to fantasy and appeals to you. For instance you pick Magic.

Step three: Write the word Magic in the middle of your empty sheet. Make sure it’s big and clear.
Step four: Think of all kinds of words that you relate to magic and perhaps fantasy. Write them around the word “magic” and link them to the word with a line. It can be any words like “Wand, wizard, evil queen, school, destiny, floating, flying, far away land, whispering trees, magical creatures, one hero” you name it.

Step five: A lot of people will be stimulated enough already to have a great idea for a story. Other still don’t. Try and take the words that you used and make a story line with it. It doesn’t matter if it sounds crappy at first. Just take a few hours and do something else. Then come back to the mind map and try again, or edit the story idea you had. You’ll probably find that you have a lot of new and fresh idea’s already.

I hope this will help you guys as much as it did me. They saved me from a lot of writer’s blocks that could have lasted for weeks and now only lasted for a few hours.

How do you cope with a writer’s block? If you have other idea’s please share them with the rest of the blog and post them in the comment section below!

Keep writing!

Xx LordKiwii