Thanks to an Amazon birthday gift card (thanks Mom & Steve!) I recently purchased Where Do You Get Your Ideas? A Writer’s Guide to Transforming Notions Into Narratives, by Fred White.
I’ve yet to dive in but admit I couldn’t resist dipping my toes into page 31. The subject? Capturing Ideas In Your Writer’s Notebook.
Writing down your thoughts, however amorphous, is important because the very effort to capture ideas in words helps to develop them. One of the most fascinating things about becoming an active idea hunter is that very act of hunting for ideas will sharpen both your observational skills and your imaginative skills. Work hard to cultivate the habit of writing down the ideas you’ve hunted down, even before you begin assessing their story potential.
One idea: Here’s an opportunity to practice idea recognition while simultaneously doing housework: Find a cluttered closet, junk drawer, or corner of your attic, basement, or garage and organize it. As you do so, see how many potential story ideas you can recognize in the items you come across. Here are two examples from a closet purging to get you going:
- Old musical audiotapes from a long-forgotten jazz quartet. Possible idea: What if a jazz enthusiast, recognizing the exceptional talent of this group, sets out to find the individual musicians and reunite them?
- A cache of holiday greetings from twenty years ago, some from friends and relatives you haven’t heard from since or have since fallen out of favor. Possible idea: What would happen if your main character attempted to reestablish a close friendship (implicit in one of the old greeting cards) that had gone sour for some reason?
How and where do YOU capture ideas?
I’ve much to learn but you’ll rarely find me without this in a nearby pocket. In it, you’ll find random ideas, quirky words/phrases, and mini notes from Marcia Moston’s devotions, given every month in our writer’s meeting.
Now to transform my notions into narratives!
Great ideas Cathy! Thanks for sharing. Now that I've started posting regularly in my blog I'm finding it more difficult than I thought to come up with ideas.
Thanks, Carol. 🙂 I'm loving your new blog — keep up the great work, my friend!
Ahh Cathy, I see you like moleskins! I would too, but it's one more thing for me to misplace. In weird places, like the freezer or a filing cabinet. I use the notepad feature on my smartphone. I can usually find THAT 😉
Susan, I should use the notepad feature as well but there's still something about the scratching of a pen on paper that makes me smile. 🙂
I'm a moleskin lady myself–never thought about my phone. Susan Stilwell will bring me into this century yet! That looks like a great book–always can use a jumpstart in the idea department.
Marcia, if anyone can bring us into this century, it's Susan! 🙂
Thanks for stopping by…
Well Cathy,
If I don't get any writing ideas at least I've got a clean drawer, right/ 🙂
Actually this is a good idea. 😉 I often find many teachable/writing material from my boys and my life as a mom — I have a mommy journal with lots of entries and then another journal in the van – it seems when we travel I get thoughts and ideas and then when I read them later I'm like, "Man that was actually pretty good" — you're right to say we should get them on paper while the thought occurs. 😉
God bless you Cathy! Love, Hester
Great perspective, Hester 🙂 I wish I'd taken more notes when our boys were younger but I suppose the Lord is giving me another opportunity with Piper and future grands!
Have a wonderful weekend, my friend. Love you!