I present to you the second half of my two part post on finding and taming inspiration. If you’d like to check out part one click here. In this part, I’m going to go into taming inspiration. Let’s get to it!
So you’re working on your manuscript. You are zoomin’, racking up 1K or more a day. Then out of nowhere: BOOM! Inspiration pounces at you at the wrong time. Now you’re stuck with it. It festers in your head pushing out your current work in progress. You love this new idea, but you need to finish this manuscript.
What the heck do you do?
This happened to me recently. I was hard at work editing Subsapien Biomech then I found this picture, the picture that inspired Red Hood.
I think it’s a pretty good idea for a book. That idea ate at me. I went to work and it tormented me all day. I could barely think and I sure as heck couldn’t concentrate on Subsapien.
Here’s what helped me:
1.) Talk to someone about it – Just tell your writing buddy(s) or that one friend that understands your insane writer brain all about it. Every little detail and it may help create more, but it’ll help you get relief so you can get it out.
2.) Let Your Brain Throw Up – Let that roiling idea just spew onto a word document or notebook. Write it all down. You can always come back to it, but you don’t want it to take you away from your current project.
3.) Let the Hype Die Down – It may take you time to get over your new idea so you can focus. It usually takes me about three days to move on.
In summary, ideas are great things. They’re unpredictable things too. Coming up with an idea is just the first part sticking with it is another. Focus is key. If you keep bouncing from project to project then you’ll never get them done.
One way I have discovered to work on two is to work on one and while you let it sit before edits you work on another one so you don’t take away from either project. So keep those ideas comin’ but don’t forget your other ones. Stick with them until they’re written! Happy writing!
ANNOUNCEMENT: I will also be posting on Sundays and Wednesdays now too. I do this on my Facebook page also, but I thought I’d do it on here. On Sundays I’ll have Soundtrack Sundays where I post a new movie/show score piece added to my Soundtrack Sundays YouTube playlist. On Wednesdays I’ll have Wonderful Word Wednesdays where I post a new vocabulary word. 🙂
You may also like:
Write What You Know … And What You Don’t Know
Twelve Rookie Writer Mistakes and How to Mend Them
Reeling In Your Reader: A Guest Post by Lauren Claire
What Anime Can Teach Us About Writing
Tone Down But Don’t Water Down
