Where to Find the Muse

Writing every day is the best way to write well, but when the muse eludes you, there are numerous places on the web to find inspiration. Some sites offer daily or weekly writing prompts.

Keep a notebook and pen with you at all times. There is no telling when an idea will hit. Jot it down, then when you need a fresh idea, review your notebook.

Read. The more you read, the more open your mind becomes to creating.

** Before you can write, you must come up with a topic. You must dig deep within you, or turn to an outside source, and find your muse, your reason for writing, your personal writing prompt. Do you want to write about the flowers growing along the side of the road, or the final thoughts of a disgruntle employee preparing to jump from a tall building into a mass of onlookers? Will your story be serious or told with a humorous slant? Sometimes the topic will answer that question for you.

Much of the time, you will sit to write with an idea already formed in your mind, but sometimes your muse will desert you, and you will have the desire to write but no idea where to go with all that creative energy. What then? What do you do when you mind goes blank?

There are several options available:

· Keep a pen and notebook with you at all times. As inspiration hits, jot down the idea. You may find inspiration in the face of an old man in the park, an interesting news story, something your six year old says on the way home from school. The sources are endless. When your mind goes blank, refer back to your notebook for a whole plethora of ideas. · Personal experiences. Often a fictional story is removed from non-fiction by something as minor as the dramatization of the event. Breaking your grandmother’s favorite vase may not be particularly riveting, but with a little elaboration, the history of the vase, the tears that did not fall, an attempt to hide the evidence only to have it found years later, this simple incident can make for a great short story. · Visit one of the following websites for writing prompt: o WritersDigest.com http://www.writersdigest.com/writingprompts.asp - Provides a daily prompt and a running list of past prompts. o WritingFix.com http://www.writingfix.com/rightbrain.htm - Provides writing prompts based on right brain thinking, left brain thinking, or a random selection of both. o The Cache http://www.humboldt.edu/~tdd2/JournalPrompts.htm - Look at the first lines of published stories, quotes, defining terms, and more for inspiration. o Writers’ Ezine http://www.writers-ezine.com/weekly/index.html - Offers a new writing promptly on a weekly basis. · Go to your favorite book and randomly open it to a page or choose a favorite passage. Often one good thought will lead to another. A scene between two lovers can lead you to creating your own love scene. An article in a magazine about your favorite movie star can lead to a fantasy scene with a movie star look alike hero. · Read. Read. And, read some more. The more you read, the more open your mind comes to the flow of words. There is a rhythm to writing a good story. Listen to the rhythm with your mind, with your ears. Read the story aloud. Read it critically, looking for what makes this story special, what is particularly effective, what stops the flow and causes you to reread the passage. · Along with reading, write. Write everyday, especially when it does not come easy. Train your mind to produce, to work through the block, to not only see the words, but to see the images behind the words. What you write does not have to be good. It is not the content that matters during these practice sessions, but the process.

Another tip to try if you are still coming up blank is to find a new place to write. In “Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within,” author Natalie Goldberg writes about going to a café or coffeehouse to write. Others may find the library more agreeable as there are less distractions.

To other writers, the place they write is not important. They can write just as well during a rock concert as a quiet home office. Their emphasis, their muse, is the feel of a good pen in their hand. If the pen is of a good weight and flows naturally along the page without splotching, they are content. While still others will find look to music to set the mood for writing and the place is irrelevant. I tend to write best with pen and paper. My mentor prefers the clicking rhythm of the keyboard as she types directly to a disk.

Don’t be afraid to try different settings, different degrees of background noise. Feel free to write the old fashion way or to dictate your story into a tape recorder for later. Find where your muse lives, where it works best, and is most open to working with you.

In other words, the muse can be found anywhere. It is up to you as a writer to look for it, to train your mind to accept it. Most importantly, you must learn to recognize the potential of everything around you as the fodder for your next story.

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