3 Ways To Attract Ideas

If there's one question authors hate with a white hot flaming passion it's this one: Where do your ideas come from?

When asked this Harlan Ellison likes to say, "Schenectady." If pressed, he might add that every week he sends the service in Schenectady $25 and they send back a fresh six-pack of ideas. (For this and more on Harlan Ellison watch the documentary of his life and work: Dreams With Sharp Teeth.)

Neil Gaiman has written and talked about this subject often and with his customary thoughtfulness and wit.

- Where do you get your ideas? by Neil Gaiman

- How Creativity Works: Neil Gaiman on Where Ideas Come From, by Maria Popova

But that's not what I'm talking about, not quite.

Attracting Ideas

Often, when I write my zero draft, I'll come to a spot and realize: that's not enough. I need something else. I need another character, another arc. Or perhaps I just know deep in my gut that I need something. Preferably something significant and interesting, something that will startle and amaze and hook the reader.

And sometimes the microsecond I realize this my mind goes blank. When this happens there are three things I do.

1. Take  a walk.

On a walk I can let my mind untether itself and wander, retreating from the multitude of daily cares that weigh it down. As my mind wanders sometimes an idea pops in.

2. Take a shower.

I don't know what it is about the shower but I've found taking one a great way of attracting ideas. Perhaps it's the sound, the feel of water flowing over skin, perhaps it's being momentarily cut off and immersed in one's private world. One feels freed to let one's mind free, to shift gears and dream.

Lately, though, I've found another way to attract ideas. A way analogous to gazing at the shifting colors of a kaleidoscope or to cloud gazing.

3. Use picture cards.

Yesterday I was writing a scene ... or trying to. I knew my characters, I knew the setting, and I knew that something new and completely different would happen at the end, something that would spin the story in another direction.

Something would happen. But what?!

I bought a couple of decks of Tall Tale cards weeks ago, the original and their Fairy Tales pack.

As I looked through the cards and thought about my scene certain cards felt right, so I put those to the side. I then took a look at the cards I'd selected and thought about what each card had in common with each of the other cards.

In this way I began to tell myself a mini-story with pictures. As I played, an idea popped in. Ah! It was the solution to my dilemma, the twist that would grab my story and send it in a new direction. (And the solution wasn't--or at least didn't seem to be--directly related to any of the cards I had chosen.)

I've tried that a few times, taking cards out and idly looking through them, seeing if anything pops. I think that perhaps pictures are a good way to communicate with my muse.

Of course, what works for me might only work for me! Though I doubt it.

Also, though I do like the Tell Tale cards, I imagine that any cards with images on them would do just fine.

When you get stuck on a story, what do you do to attract ideas?

Photo credit: "Amsterdam Calling" by Vieira_da_Silva under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0.

How To See Through Your Character's Eyes

When we're using a point-of-view character we know what they know. We see what they see. We hear what they hear.

But what a character notices will depend on what kind of person they are.

As a result, what a character pays attention to will give us a wealth of information about them. For instance, what sounds irritate her, what scents tantalize? When she walks through a park what will she notice first, the beautiful scenery (is she a photographer?) or the children running around (does she desperately want kids?).

As Kami McArthur writes in David Farland’s Daily Kick in the Pants—Tightening Your Focus:

When you’re writing a tale, it almost always turns out better if you get deep into the head of your protagonist and tell the story from that person’s point of view.

But how do we get inside a characters head? Kami has a few pointers.

1. Determine your characters dominant sense

I've heard that each of us has a dominant sense that they use when learning. For example it's said this is how it breaks down:

25-30% visual
25-30% auditory
15% tactile/kinesthetic
25-30% mixed modalities

How does your character learn? Through seeing? Hearing? Touch?

If they are a visual learner then when you use this character's point of view the visual properties of the environment should dominate. If auditory then the auditory properties, and so on. (Apparently some folks learn most by smell. Who knew?!)

This also provides yet another way to differentiate characters.

Kami gives a terrific example:

... I had a companion who remembered people’s cars. If someone had a red 72 Chevy, he’d see the car in a parking lot and say, “Hey, there’s John Thomas!” Then I would look up, and John was nowhere to be seen. I recall vividly one day how he began naming off people and saying, “There’s John, and the Metzgers, and the Sally Day, and . . .” I looked up eagerly, and there wasn’t a single person on the street. He named a dozen people just by looking at their cars.

2. A characters profession will affect what they notice

For instance, Kami writes:

As a corrections officer, I always made note of unlocked gates or doors left open when I was driving through town. I’d watch strangers to see how they moved, where they put their hands. I’d be careful when walking into restaurants, making sure to place my back to a wall and give myself a clear field of view to see who had enter.

3. Your character will have certain criteria for judging others

Your character may not be self-aware enough to know they have criteria, but we all do, even when we try not to. Does your character focus on:

makeup,

clothes,

social-economic status,

what a person does for a living,

how much money they make,

what kind of car they drive,

who they know,

whether they're good at their job,

intelligence, 

grammar,

speech patterns,

whether someone is environmentally conscious, and so on.

Kami writes:

A young woman may judge a new girl by her designer labels, or her hair, rather than her friendliness and her smile. A young man may only be interested in befriending another boy if he thinks that the boy would be an asset to the football team. A third person may avoid people who are wealthy, while a fourth might gravitate toward people who have a strong sense of humor.

4. What specific knowledge does your character have?

What can your character do well? What are they an expert in? Kami gives the example of a young parent.

These are the kinds of things a young parent would be able to tell you:

- Where the baby is
- How many diapers they have and where they are
- When the baby wakes, when they sleep, when they want to play
- What they liked to eat

The same sort of thing applies to a chef, or a hunter, or a police person. They would each pay attention to different things, notice different things, so if you described the same scene from four different perspectives you would learn something different each time.

I've only skimmed the wealth of information in Kami McArthur's article, I encourage all of you to head over to David Farland's site and read it.

#  #  #

I don't usually dedicate my blog posts to anyone, but I'm dedicating this one to the people of Boston. My heart goes out to them and to the families and friends of those injured or dead. They have become a brilliant example for all of us on how to handle a crisis.

Other articles you might like:

- 50 Shades Of Grey: The Most Profitable Books Of All Time?
- 5 Rules For Writing A Murder Mystery: Keeping the Murderer Secret Until The End
- Publish Your Own Magazine On Flipboard!

Photo credit: "Chris 02 © studio.es" by Vincent Boiteau under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0.