Coming up with fresh ideas as a writer and creative can be challenging.
Let’s talk the nuts and bolts of how to do it!
1. Take time out
When we’re busy, it’s more important than ever to allow ourselves to daydream.
This is an area that many of us neglect: we’re so caught up with what we’re doing, buried in deep work on our projects, that we don’t give ourselves permission to consciously build in moments of respite.
It’s too easy to use so much energy actually doing the work of authoring that we don’t step back to feed that process. This can deplete our creative selves: without input, there’s no output. It simply isn’t possible to keep going without recognising this and recharging our batteries.
Often, the connections we make and ideas we come up with happen when we aren’t actively working hard and thinking about something.
Switch off, take a breather. Let your brain tick away and do its thing while you’re doing something else.
You might be surprised by what you uncover!
2. Go to the source
What inspires you? What gives you that energetic, enthusiastic feeling inside?
No two people are alike in what floats their boat, so it’s important to find what works for you.
Dylan Thomas retreated to Laugharne in Wales to write, while George Orwell travelled to the Scottish island of Jura to work on his masterpiece, Nineteen Eighty-Four. It’s no coincidence that those locations are elemental, beautiful and perfect for walks and uninterrupted space during the graft of putting pen to paper.
If there’s a particular place you like to go for inspiration – or simply to clear your head – make time to do it, even if it’s only for a few minutes a week. It doesn’t have to be miles away: somewhere accessible and close to home is just as good.
Stepping away from the workaday and going to the source is one of the best gifts you can give yourself as a writer.
3. Note it down
Any journalist worth their salt will tell you that always having a notebook to hand is essential. There are some excellent ways of noting something that catches your eye.
Creatives use handy apps such as Evernote, Notion or Pocket to record images, links, articles and anything else they’ve seen. Voice notes are immediate and save having to write anything down; the advantage is that you can go back over them later and properly absorb what’s been said.
If something piques your interest: note it, get it down somewhere online, screenshot or photograph it – or you might forget it.
4. Know your onions
One lesson we can learn from top creatives is that they never stop trawling for ideas and insight. In fact, they actively seek them out.
For example, Turner Prize-winning artist Sir Grayson Perry goes to galleries on weekdays when it’s quiet, so he can glean new ideas for his work and engage with what’s on show.
Try these for great fresh input:
- Keeping abreast of what’s happening in your field
- Keeping up to date with industry publications
- Surfing the web to check out others’ work
- Engaging with others online and offline
- Talking shop
Scanning news stories, interacting in online forums, groups, on social media and the blogosphere, as well as checking out creative writing and longform – all of these can be rewarding and a valuable source of support and inspiration for writers.
And this one is essential: read, read, read!
If you haven’t done that classic work of literature you’ve always been meaning to get through, or that novel or poetry anthology has been gathering dust in that TBR pile beside your bed, now’s a great time to start.
If you’re seriously busy, just do a few pages or a chapter at a time. It’s perfectly fine to tackle it in chunks, especially if it’s a mammoth tome!
Study the maestros, because being exposed to great authors really can help your writing.
5. Mind map it
While Tony Buzan popularised the spider diagram in the 1970s, this method of thought trailing has in fact been around for centuries. It’s a freeing tool for creative brainstorming, because it isn’t linear thinking which can order and restrict your thoughts.
You start with a central topic, then work out from there in as many directions as you like. One thought bubble follows on from another, and you can find yourself coming up with ideas you hadn’t previously imagined.
This is a great way to create topics that you can then go on to outline for an article or longform piece. You can even use it to start collecting ideas to drill down into chapters for a book.
6. Creativity breeds creativity
The more you tap into your creative energy, the more easily it comes.
For example, following on from an article I wrote about inspiration, I took a moment to think of other things I could write about.
Within the space of a few minutes I came up with three story ideas: one related to that specific article, which resulted in this piece; while the other two fed into other potential content creation.
Once you start to build momentum, you get into the flow. As the late, great Maya Angelou said:
“You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”
The trick is to keep going, and that happens with regular practice.
7. Prioritise your practice
If your creative cup runneth over and you’ve lots of ideas, trying to work out which one you should follow up can be tricky.
Go for the one that’s most feasible, interesting or time-sensitive right now, then pencil in the rest to do when you can. This way you can start on a realistically achievable project, rather than scattering your energy by trying to tackle everything at once and experiencing overwhelm.
Great ideas won’t go away, so you can sit on them for a little while – but do make sure they don’t get buried completely by the workaday stuff that you have to do.
It’s great you’re feeling so inspired, so enjoy it!
Lisa Cordaro Publishing Services 