Any good techniques to overcome writer's block?

Question

I'm after creative writing exercises or tips for coming up with ideas for stories. I've been trying for a couple of weeks and so far with little inspiration. I don't expect anyone to give me ideas, just ways of coming up with my own. Thanks!

Answer 1

Get up and walk around a bit.

Flip open a dictionary and pick out of few interesting words.

Just start writing--ANYTHING. It makes no difference what it is. Sometimes once you get past the first sentence, you're loosened up enough to keep going.

Hang out somewhere people go, and watch for a while. Absorb. Make a few notes, then use whatever you've got to make a short story. Just for yourself. No pressure.

Take a story you already know, twist it up, make it your own.

Answer 2

Writer's block's a dud. I do have a few suggestions, if they work. Most writer's block, I believe, happens when you hit a snag in whatever your writing. It doesn't always present itself, but you feel it. Oh, you feel it. What can help is focusing on other projects at a time and the chink will right itself out. And Stephen King, I've read, worked on multiple short stories while he was in heat with a chunky novel. So, write some short stories if you want. I don't think though that you have to look for ideas. Ideas fall from the sky and drop in your lap when they're ready, you can't consiously look for them. But if you need inspiration, read, a lot. That's the best thing you can do for ideas.

Answer 3

When I took a writing class several years ago, we were told that sometimes we get writer's block because we are stuck in a rut of day-to-day habits, so what we need to do is start trying things that we have never tried before, to give our senses a new way of thinking. For example, I went and walked through a cemetery after 10 pm, just because I had never done that before. It proved helpful in describing sights and sounds of a character in a new story who was outside at night. Hope this helps!

Answer 4

I write music/songs on guitar. Although it's not the exact same thing as fiction, when I get writer's block, I stop playing guitar for a while and go out for walks, meet up with people I haven't seen for a while or watch movies or read books I haven't read in a while. Have experiences, feel new emotions and discover new things. Subconciously it gives you a big boost. You go back to the pen/guitar with a fresh perspective and a new momentum.

Good luck.

Answer 5

The way I get rid of writers block is by looking more intimately at things that I usually pass over with just one eye. Like 2 people walking down a street, you don't really take much notice but look closely and try to imagine where they have been, what they are going to walk into and how they would deal with it. And don't try too hard!

Answer 6

Try doing 'morning pages'. You get up a bit earlier and write 3 sides of A4 just about whatever is in your head. Nobody must read these, they are not to be written with a wider audience in mind, but you have to write the three sides. It opens you right up and stops you feeling blocked. Just try it for a week or two and writing won't seem like such a high mountain.

Answer 7

For me it takes remembering an event from the past.
Or I try doing what Stephen King says he does. He'll think at some impromptu moment a snippet of something....he jots it down..(it could be just a word or a fragment of a sentence) and throws it in a drawer. Then when he needs to jump start an idea or a thought he goes to his drawer.

Answer 8

Think of someone in your family or circle of friends that always seems to inspire you. Then go talk to them til an idea hits you. I'm my brother's Muse. We banter back and forth and then all of a sudden, he'll get up and start drawing out a great sketch or writing a short story.

Answer 9

Throw yourself into the path of a moving train---not literally (but I did get your attention)--but---spend an afternoon in the waiting room of the emergency area of the local hospital---observe--if you can spend an hour or two in this envoirnment without coming to something to write---you probably need to give it up and start taking classes in pottery

Answer 10

I would try meditating. Go for a quick walk or try some new food. Sometimes if you look at a dictionary that could spring a thought. Solve a Soduko puzzle.Hope it helps. Good luck!