Luxcario
'Humans are interesting.'
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- he
-
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Issues with inspiration
- Thread starter Luxcario
- Start date
Ever
wants to play mafia
- Pronoun
- ve/ver/it/its
Music Dragon
Doosic Maggon
- Pronoun
- she
DarkAura
loves terra "brain cells? idk her" kingdomhearts
Well, perfection takes time and patience. You can't make a one hit wonder in ten seconds flat! You gotta put your heart into it and have enough patience, and then inspiration will come.
And you can't go quiting on stories because you don't like it. If you don't like it, make it about something else, not just quitting on it. Just put your heart into it and inspiration will come. =)
And you can't go quiting on stories because you don't like it. If you don't like it, make it about something else, not just quitting on it. Just put your heart into it and inspiration will come. =)
Teh Ebil Snorlax
izombie, uzombie, weallzombie
Don't just try to write a story. It doesn't work. Stories for stories' sake are bullshit. What message do you want your story to convey? It doesn't have to be a radical political message, it can be something as simple as "love never dies", but you need a message. All good stories have at least one message to send and the story is then constructed around the messages it wants to convey. Messages often lead to inspiration, I find.
Music Dragon
Doosic Maggon
- Pronoun
- she
I disagree. I think this is probably something that varies a lot from person to person, but I find that the best stories are the ones you write when you're not actively trying to tell a message. I like to just sit down and write for the sake of it, and see what comes out. I'm not saying you can't plan ahead when writing; it's just that, personally, I don't like going all "I'm going to write a story about how love never dies", because then it ends up being too artificial and unsubtle; I prefer writing first, then figuring out what it means, then tweaking it to reinforce that theme and make it more coherent. You discover a lot about a story in the process of writing it, and you often end up with something completely different from what you started with, so in that sense, "planning" is somewhat... futile.
Mai
Banned
Not all RPGs have decent characters. A significant amount do not.
M&F
tikitok
- Pronoun
- any
The primary function of storytelling is entertainment. A message without entertainment becomes just as Music Dragon described: artificial and unsubtle. Not to mention boring and incapable of captivating, and these aspects tend to prevent the message from coming across. As such, the message is complementary to a story, not essential. That said, if you can spawn an interesting idea from a message, it's not at all bad; it's just that it's not enough by itself, and it's not something everyone can and/or enjoys doing.
Inspiration comes to each writer differently.
That said, being highly involved in writing is helpful in that aspect. It's been suggested before, but, I'll restate: writing and reading tends to yield good results. Both are activities of creativity -- either coming from oneself, or receiving it from outside -- and have good chances of leading to inspiration. Or even hinting at a more decisive means, if there is one.
Teh Ebil Snorlax
izombie, uzombie, weallzombie
Of course, I wasn't trying to advocate "pick a message, write a story about it" as a storytelling method. Not once in my life have I written a story that I didn't just write to tell a story and then mould the story around the themes I create in the writing process (for example, there is almost no planning involved in any of the fiction blogs I write, even the one I co-write with someone else). I was suggesting it as a method of pulling out inspiration. I should have prefixed everything I said with "when you're suffering from writer's block", since I was offering it as a solution to Luxcario's problem.
That said, I wholeheartedly disagree with the idea that a message is not essential to a story. Every good story has at least one message, be it something as complex and challenging as Anathem or as simple as The Ugly Duckling. A story cannot exist without a message because otherwise its just a bunch of things that happen for no particular reason. The character's motivations, the obstacles they face, the central conflict, the story must be a commentary on something or else none of these things exist. If Character A is trying to create Outcome P because of Motivation X and Character B is trying to create Outcome Q because of Motivation Y and these characters conflict, then the story is some sort of commentary on Motivations X and Y or Outcomes P and Q.
Hiikaru
Run.
- Pronoun
- he
I'm going to give you the opposite advice of everyone here, because it doesn't work. It's tied in with the idea that writing is some magical calling that only special magic people who were just ~born that way~ can follow, and that you should just sit and wait for a magical special idea to fall into your head, and if that never happens, well, too bad, you just weren't born to be a writer. People just sit and hope that someday the stars will align correctly to give them the magical power to become a writer, and that... never happens. Because writing isn't some magical weird thing that's mysteriously granted to you if you just keep your head down and wait patiently, it's hard work! And sometimes that means writing when you don't have magical mysterious inspiration coursing through your veins.
It is true that sometimes you're suddenly inspired! (although it's still not really magic - there are Reasons why inspiration comes to people) And if someone has fun just writing when they're inspired and otherwise they're perfectly happy doing other things they enjoy and don't mind at all when they don't write, well, that's okay for those people! There are also sometimes people who mostly write when they feel like writing and who still end up writing a lot and having clear paths. However, if you're worrying about not having ideas, you're clearly not either of those kinds of people (at least not at the moment), and with the latter, you'll find that the reason they write so much even though they only write when they feel like it is that they think about writing a lot! That's where good inspiration and just "feeling like writing" feelings tend to come from - thinking about writing a lot!
It's no coincidence, therefore, that writing a lot inspires people - it gets you to think about writing. The more you force yourself to write, whether you're inspired or not, the more you'll think about writing, and so the more ideas you'll have! However many times people stubbornly repeat the idea that writing is magic and ideas are magic and there's simply nothing you can do but sit until something magical magically comes to you, it will not suddenly start being true - it's perfectly okay and even a really good idea to force yourself to write.
You have to remember that writing is tough. It's okay if your writing isn't at the standard you want it to be at just yet, but it's not because you're having bad ideas. It's just because writing is really, really hard, and it takes a lot of practice and dedication to get to be good at it! Basically any idea (maybe any!!) could be turned into a really good book, so when you write, try not to feel too silly about your ideas. If one is boring for you, it's okay not to want that one, but you can write about whatever you like! Everglider had a good idea in just writing lots of one-shots (or it could be pieces of longer stories) while you're working out what you'd like to write about - but in addition to that, sometimes it can also be a good experience to keep writing for a while even if the story seems boring right now! Stories are kind of like plants; they need to be exposed to sunshine and watered frequently in order to grow! And sometimes you have a kind of plant where you can take off a leaf and grow a whole new plant, which will survive on its own even if the old one dies. And you'll know more about how to take care of the kind of plant with the new one, too - maybe you figured out how much water to give it and how close to put it to the window so it would get plenty of sunlight, or how to keep the cats from eating it. So the new plant will be even healthier and happier! That is, practicing writing is always a good thing, even if what you're writing happens to turn out really badly. And lots of times ideas from previous stories work their way into new ones, where they work a lot better and have a lot more room to expand on them!
Even though lots of people seem to think so, there's absolutely nothing in the world that's harmful about forcing yourself to write. It's good for practice, it's good so that you think about writing more, and it's good so that you get farther along with your ideas and find more ideas to work with! It's difficult to force yourself to write, and you'll find yourself writing dry or dull words far more often than you'd like, but that's the case even if you are magically totally inspired. In fact, it's really frustrating to suddenly have a good idea and sit down to write it only to end up misrepresenting your good idea with bad words! You'll write badly frequently by forcing yourself to write, but that would happen anyway. People just can't write well all the time! It's too hard! And by writing as regularly as you can, even if it involves forcing your writing sometimes, you'll output a lot more decent or even good writing, as you'll have more opportunity to write well! And then as you get more and more practice, even the worst of your writing will improve a lot!
Writing only when inspired can be really harmful, though. It can be really frustrating, as then when you finally get the inspiration you've been waiting for for weeks or months (or even years), you try to write, and it just turns out badly, and since you never write, you don't know how to cope with that! Then the inspiration gets over and all you have to show for it are a few messy paragraphs, and now you can't write for ages again! Lots of people train themselves to believe that inspiration is the be-all and end-all of writing, and what tends to go along with that is the idea that if it doesn't work out like that for you, you're just not cut out to be a writer, even though you'd really, really like to be! That's just sad and frustrating and makes it so lots of people never tell their stories! Again, it does work for some people to only write when they feel like it, but there's this pervasive idea that that's the best way for every writer to be, and that just keeps lots of people from even trying!
Everglider is also right that you can search for inspiration, and sometimes it's helpful to do that, too! You'll have to find on your own what sorts of things inspire you in particular, but I think it's accurate to say that that would frequently involve going out of your normal range and doing things you don't always do. Putting yourself in a new or unusual situation is kind of exciting, and the excitement of it can open your imagination! My best source of ideas comes from just having regular conversations with people. People are exciting! So much happens to everyone, even the people who think they're boring! And conversations like to take interesting turns that can suddenly give you an idea! I come up with a lot of stories or pieces of them by expanding on something someone said. For instance, one time a friend drew a picture with two Pokemon talking next to a flower and said maybe one was telling a story about the flower, and I said "once upon a time, there was a flower!" and then I said some more things about the flower, and after a few sentences it turned into a real story and I kept going. And lots of people liked the flower story! A different time I was drawing an island and Mom started talking to me about it, and that turned into my novel about a baby dragon on an island! Talking to people is also a good idea for existing stories, especially if you know someone who would be interested in your writing - sometimes a friendly bit of interest or someone to cheer you on can give you some of the spark you need to keep going with your story and to make it a better one!
I read a while ago about a published author who said people at conventions always come up to em to say "hey, I had this really awesome idea! How about you write the book for me, and we'll split the profits fifty-fifty?" They think they're being generous and that the author will obviously accept, but ey always says no (ey couldn't write all eir ideas if ey tried), as "ideas are cheap." And I agree with that! Ideas are everywhere. There are so many stories that will never be written, because even if everyone in the whole world just holed themselves up and wrote all day every day, there are just too many ideas! It's not really about being super-clever and spinning things out of thin air, it's about seeing that the things you already know and are thinking about are stories. And good ones, if you put the effort into them! It takes a shift in perception to be able to see that there are stories everywhere, but there really are! People just train themselves to think that it has to be a big magical idea that suddenly hits them, when really, lots of times it's a small but interesting idea that's been nurtured and cared for until it became something worthwhile.
It's really easy for people to assume writers are magical beings who are different from everyone, or that writing is a magical thing that requires magical inspiration, because they're taught that and never hear it challenged, but... that's just not the case! Writing requires hard work and learning just like any other occupation or pursuit - just because it's about stories doesn't make it any easier or more magical than, say, plumbing. Although writing is pretty cool, and you should feel cool for being a writer! It's a tough thing to be doing, and even if you've only written a little and deleted it, you're a writer, and you've fought the toughness and all the weird ideas about how you have to be magical, and put words on a page! Go, you!
Why won't they? That's what published authors who are writing as a job have to do is force themselves to write! Because forcing ideas isn't bad. Sure, lots of them won't turn out well, but sometimes you need to make a mess to get anywhere with your story! Forcing yourself to write creates gems that wouldn't exist if you had just sat there hoping for an idea instead! They're gems within garbage, but it's okay to write garbage. Everyone does it, and you need to get the garbage out of the way. How else will you find anything good buried under all of it? How else can writers practice? How else can they get over crippling fear of writing badly?
Why? What's bad about writing a story just for the sake of writing? Writing needs heart, sure, I can get behind that! But you can force yourself to write and still put your heart into it! There's nothing harmful about forced writing, because there's nothing actually harmful about writing badly - and there's nothing harmful about dull writing written by people who didn't really care about the story, either, really. If someone is just writing for money or fame or something, the story's not really going to turn out well, but that's not harmful. It's just another story in the world that's not particularly good. That's fine. And forcing yourself to write can even cause good words to come out, too, so that's even more fine!
It can be inspiring, but don't you also find that stories that are too focused on an agenda are heavy-handed and boring? It's a common complaint with fiction, the idea that the author only wrote it to tell people about whatever or to teach a moral, and so didn't put effort into the actual story!
This, too:
(edit: Oh, I guess TES replied to the latter part while I wasn't looking. But I'll leave it there anyway!)
It is true that sometimes you're suddenly inspired! (although it's still not really magic - there are Reasons why inspiration comes to people) And if someone has fun just writing when they're inspired and otherwise they're perfectly happy doing other things they enjoy and don't mind at all when they don't write, well, that's okay for those people! There are also sometimes people who mostly write when they feel like writing and who still end up writing a lot and having clear paths. However, if you're worrying about not having ideas, you're clearly not either of those kinds of people (at least not at the moment), and with the latter, you'll find that the reason they write so much even though they only write when they feel like it is that they think about writing a lot! That's where good inspiration and just "feeling like writing" feelings tend to come from - thinking about writing a lot!
It's no coincidence, therefore, that writing a lot inspires people - it gets you to think about writing. The more you force yourself to write, whether you're inspired or not, the more you'll think about writing, and so the more ideas you'll have! However many times people stubbornly repeat the idea that writing is magic and ideas are magic and there's simply nothing you can do but sit until something magical magically comes to you, it will not suddenly start being true - it's perfectly okay and even a really good idea to force yourself to write.
You have to remember that writing is tough. It's okay if your writing isn't at the standard you want it to be at just yet, but it's not because you're having bad ideas. It's just because writing is really, really hard, and it takes a lot of practice and dedication to get to be good at it! Basically any idea (maybe any!!) could be turned into a really good book, so when you write, try not to feel too silly about your ideas. If one is boring for you, it's okay not to want that one, but you can write about whatever you like! Everglider had a good idea in just writing lots of one-shots (or it could be pieces of longer stories) while you're working out what you'd like to write about - but in addition to that, sometimes it can also be a good experience to keep writing for a while even if the story seems boring right now! Stories are kind of like plants; they need to be exposed to sunshine and watered frequently in order to grow! And sometimes you have a kind of plant where you can take off a leaf and grow a whole new plant, which will survive on its own even if the old one dies. And you'll know more about how to take care of the kind of plant with the new one, too - maybe you figured out how much water to give it and how close to put it to the window so it would get plenty of sunlight, or how to keep the cats from eating it. So the new plant will be even healthier and happier! That is, practicing writing is always a good thing, even if what you're writing happens to turn out really badly. And lots of times ideas from previous stories work their way into new ones, where they work a lot better and have a lot more room to expand on them!
Even though lots of people seem to think so, there's absolutely nothing in the world that's harmful about forcing yourself to write. It's good for practice, it's good so that you think about writing more, and it's good so that you get farther along with your ideas and find more ideas to work with! It's difficult to force yourself to write, and you'll find yourself writing dry or dull words far more often than you'd like, but that's the case even if you are magically totally inspired. In fact, it's really frustrating to suddenly have a good idea and sit down to write it only to end up misrepresenting your good idea with bad words! You'll write badly frequently by forcing yourself to write, but that would happen anyway. People just can't write well all the time! It's too hard! And by writing as regularly as you can, even if it involves forcing your writing sometimes, you'll output a lot more decent or even good writing, as you'll have more opportunity to write well! And then as you get more and more practice, even the worst of your writing will improve a lot!
Writing only when inspired can be really harmful, though. It can be really frustrating, as then when you finally get the inspiration you've been waiting for for weeks or months (or even years), you try to write, and it just turns out badly, and since you never write, you don't know how to cope with that! Then the inspiration gets over and all you have to show for it are a few messy paragraphs, and now you can't write for ages again! Lots of people train themselves to believe that inspiration is the be-all and end-all of writing, and what tends to go along with that is the idea that if it doesn't work out like that for you, you're just not cut out to be a writer, even though you'd really, really like to be! That's just sad and frustrating and makes it so lots of people never tell their stories! Again, it does work for some people to only write when they feel like it, but there's this pervasive idea that that's the best way for every writer to be, and that just keeps lots of people from even trying!
Everglider is also right that you can search for inspiration, and sometimes it's helpful to do that, too! You'll have to find on your own what sorts of things inspire you in particular, but I think it's accurate to say that that would frequently involve going out of your normal range and doing things you don't always do. Putting yourself in a new or unusual situation is kind of exciting, and the excitement of it can open your imagination! My best source of ideas comes from just having regular conversations with people. People are exciting! So much happens to everyone, even the people who think they're boring! And conversations like to take interesting turns that can suddenly give you an idea! I come up with a lot of stories or pieces of them by expanding on something someone said. For instance, one time a friend drew a picture with two Pokemon talking next to a flower and said maybe one was telling a story about the flower, and I said "once upon a time, there was a flower!" and then I said some more things about the flower, and after a few sentences it turned into a real story and I kept going. And lots of people liked the flower story! A different time I was drawing an island and Mom started talking to me about it, and that turned into my novel about a baby dragon on an island! Talking to people is also a good idea for existing stories, especially if you know someone who would be interested in your writing - sometimes a friendly bit of interest or someone to cheer you on can give you some of the spark you need to keep going with your story and to make it a better one!
I read a while ago about a published author who said people at conventions always come up to em to say "hey, I had this really awesome idea! How about you write the book for me, and we'll split the profits fifty-fifty?" They think they're being generous and that the author will obviously accept, but ey always says no (ey couldn't write all eir ideas if ey tried), as "ideas are cheap." And I agree with that! Ideas are everywhere. There are so many stories that will never be written, because even if everyone in the whole world just holed themselves up and wrote all day every day, there are just too many ideas! It's not really about being super-clever and spinning things out of thin air, it's about seeing that the things you already know and are thinking about are stories. And good ones, if you put the effort into them! It takes a shift in perception to be able to see that there are stories everywhere, but there really are! People just train themselves to think that it has to be a big magical idea that suddenly hits them, when really, lots of times it's a small but interesting idea that's been nurtured and cared for until it became something worthwhile.
It's really easy for people to assume writers are magical beings who are different from everyone, or that writing is a magical thing that requires magical inspiration, because they're taught that and never hear it challenged, but... that's just not the case! Writing requires hard work and learning just like any other occupation or pursuit - just because it's about stories doesn't make it any easier or more magical than, say, plumbing. Although writing is pretty cool, and you should feel cool for being a writer! It's a tough thing to be doing, and even if you've only written a little and deleted it, you're a writer, and you've fought the toughness and all the weird ideas about how you have to be magical, and put words on a page! Go, you!
Why won't they? That's what published authors who are writing as a job have to do is force themselves to write! Because forcing ideas isn't bad. Sure, lots of them won't turn out well, but sometimes you need to make a mess to get anywhere with your story! Forcing yourself to write creates gems that wouldn't exist if you had just sat there hoping for an idea instead! They're gems within garbage, but it's okay to write garbage. Everyone does it, and you need to get the garbage out of the way. How else will you find anything good buried under all of it? How else can writers practice? How else can they get over crippling fear of writing badly?
Why? What's bad about writing a story just for the sake of writing? Writing needs heart, sure, I can get behind that! But you can force yourself to write and still put your heart into it! There's nothing harmful about forced writing, because there's nothing actually harmful about writing badly - and there's nothing harmful about dull writing written by people who didn't really care about the story, either, really. If someone is just writing for money or fame or something, the story's not really going to turn out well, but that's not harmful. It's just another story in the world that's not particularly good. That's fine. And forcing yourself to write can even cause good words to come out, too, so that's even more fine!
TES said:
It can be inspiring, but don't you also find that stories that are too focused on an agenda are heavy-handed and boring? It's a common complaint with fiction, the idea that the author only wrote it to tell people about whatever or to teach a moral, and so didn't put effort into the actual story!
This, too:
Orson Scott Card said:
(edit: Oh, I guess TES replied to the latter part while I wasn't looking. But I'll leave it there anyway!)
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Zero Moment
Vinyl Scratch
- Pronoun
- He
Cerberus87
Done.
I haven't read the thread yet, will read it later, but I just felt I need to post this.
(before anyone asks I'm a huge Fate/Stay Night fan!)
So, the thing about Kanshou and Bakuya is that they were created without an idea behind them, but for the sake of creating art. And they're still very fine blades. The same could be said for any form of art - you don't always need a message behind what you write. What if you just want to tell a story about characters and their actions? The principal idea of your story might not even exist before you write; you keep adding stuff as you go, and it evolves into a monster not even its creator (you!) can control. People might say stuff about the finished product that you weren't even considering when you first wrote your work. And you might agree with them, and it's up to you to accept or abandon your work.
Another thing: the craftsmanship of writing is NOT easy. Even if you feel inspired. Sometimes I don't write not because I lack inspiration but because I want to avoid the hard work, because it is hard. Even a three-line poem may take more work than you think. And I don't talk about creative writing only. Essays, reports, even this post(!), all of them require a certain understanding of a technique you need to acquire through repetition and reading. If writing was easy, learning languages would be incredibly effortless and everyone would be fluent in 20 languages. Learn the rules (grammar, syntax). Learn words, just not for the sake of it, because fancy wording without reason is a bore.
English is not my first language; I only learned it because I've played so many games in English and nowadays all the best stuff is written in English since it's the universal language (the English Wikipedia for example is by far the most developed one). I was taking German classes and it was much harder for me to learn because 1) it's a harder language; 2) opportunities to practise it were scarce outside of the course; 3) the gender of almost everything is different from my own first language, to top it off there's a whole set of neutral articles and pronouns! Language is a never-ending learning process. I have two ESOL English certificates but in no way do I consider myself a "master" of English language.
And listen to Hiikaru. Always.
Type-Moon Wiki said:
(before anyone asks I'm a huge Fate/Stay Night fan!)
So, the thing about Kanshou and Bakuya is that they were created without an idea behind them, but for the sake of creating art. And they're still very fine blades. The same could be said for any form of art - you don't always need a message behind what you write. What if you just want to tell a story about characters and their actions? The principal idea of your story might not even exist before you write; you keep adding stuff as you go, and it evolves into a monster not even its creator (you!) can control. People might say stuff about the finished product that you weren't even considering when you first wrote your work. And you might agree with them, and it's up to you to accept or abandon your work.
Another thing: the craftsmanship of writing is NOT easy. Even if you feel inspired. Sometimes I don't write not because I lack inspiration but because I want to avoid the hard work, because it is hard. Even a three-line poem may take more work than you think. And I don't talk about creative writing only. Essays, reports, even this post(!), all of them require a certain understanding of a technique you need to acquire through repetition and reading. If writing was easy, learning languages would be incredibly effortless and everyone would be fluent in 20 languages. Learn the rules (grammar, syntax). Learn words, just not for the sake of it, because fancy wording without reason is a bore.
English is not my first language; I only learned it because I've played so many games in English and nowadays all the best stuff is written in English since it's the universal language (the English Wikipedia for example is by far the most developed one). I was taking German classes and it was much harder for me to learn because 1) it's a harder language; 2) opportunities to practise it were scarce outside of the course; 3) the gender of almost everything is different from my own first language, to top it off there's a whole set of neutral articles and pronouns! Language is a never-ending learning process. I have two ESOL English certificates but in no way do I consider myself a "master" of English language.
And listen to Hiikaru. Always.
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