99% Perspiration

A post about ideas and inspiration

It feels like there’s a lot going on in the world right now, and in some ways posting about things that aren’t those big serious things feels a little frivolous. But… on the flip side, I think perhaps still finding ways to be frivolous, and to have fun, and to create spaces where we can all feel human together is perhaps more important than ever. So, in the spirit of helping people make those things, and helping that put silly, dumb, essential things out in the world, posting nonsense like this will continue relentlessly. And today, I thought I’d talk a little but about inspiration.

I’ve said before that one of my favorite quotes about writing comes from W. Somerset Maugham: “I write only when inspiration strikes. Fortunately, it strikes every morning at nine o’clock sharp.” That resonates with me. As someone who writes for a living (not fiction! I’m not crazy and living out of a cardboard box over here…) I can’t afford to wait for the muse to move me before I start to write a client’s website or email or brochure. I have deadlines, goddamit. So, instead, I sit down, I look at the brief, and I apply fingers to the keyboard.

Now, I will say, that sometimes what comes out sucks. Or at least is very mediocre. But maybe that’s the first thing I have to say about inspiration, sometimes it doesn’t come. But the critical thing is: don’t let that stop you. Because writing isn’t one and done. You don’t just dash off some brilliance and walk away like a movie hero who just lit a fuse. You come back to it. You edit. You rewrite. You cut. You rephrase. You tweak. Writing is an ongoing act, inspiration can come at any point along the way, can come in tiny fragments, can just be a decision to change one word. So write uninspired, and then tinker your way to greatness from there.

In all honesty, I’ve found that how I feel about the writing in the moment of creation rarely affects the quality of the prose itself. It’s definitely more fun to write and feel enthused and excited about the work, but ultimately when I come back to those words, they’re rarely any better or worse than the ones that came out when it felt like I was pulling teeth. And once the editing sheen has been applied, I don’t think anyone can tell. Part of learning to write is learning to write through the times when it feels like it sucks, to know that you’ll come out the other side, and have some time when it feels like flying. And learning also that you’ll come out the other side of that feeling too.

The other main thing I’ll say about inspiration is that ideas are cheap. There used to be a thing—maybe it still exists, but it hasn’t happened to me in a while—where someone would reach out to a writer and announce they had a Great Idea™ for a book, and if I agreed to split the profits 50-50 with them they’d tell me the idea, and I could write it. Derisive laughter generally ensued. Because the work isn’t the idea. The work is chiseling away in the word mines turning an idea into something that is actually interesting and fun to read. The idea is nothing without execution.

So, yes, ideas are cheap, however it occurs to me that after 20+ years of writing stories that it is perhaps easy to become complacent about generating them. Coming up with ideas is, I suspect, a bit like a muscle—the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets.

So the first exercise tip for coming up with an idea is that it’s important to set aside the time to sit down and come up with one. I think there’s this romanticized notion of ideas coming like thunderbolts out of the blue. That’s rarely been the case for me. When I sit down to do the weekly stories for this site, I often don’t have any idea what it will be. The first ten minutes or so is brainstorming time.

Also, a brainstorm means generating multiple ideas. Because some ideas are bad. Possibly most. And sometimes ideas need to meet and make friends, and have babies together. So giving brainstorming the space and time it needs is a must.

There are also aids to brainstorming. Writing prompts are easy to find online, for example. Although, if you do that, I’d recommend reading a lot of them and letting them cross-pollinate. Find ways to riff on them. Find ways to make them your own. Although, that said, if you see something that just immediately speaks to you, go for it. There is no invalid form of inspiration.

Personally, I have always found art really helps as a jumping off point. I have a Pinterest board of literally thousands of images that I feel have the potential to be the key image in a story. And for me, it’s figuring out the bit that’s missing that is fascinating. It’s looking at a picture and trying to work out the story that goes around it that gives me the seed of an idea. At least half of the flash pieces on this site have started out with random images prompting an idea in my head.

But again, that’s me. Not you. So, mess around with the brainstorming process. Explore ways of coming up with ideas. And always remember, the idea is cheap. It’s the execution that matters. And the execution is not a moment, but a process. Highs and lows are part of it. Keep pushing. Keep creating. Keep making spaces where people can come and congregate and feel warm inside, no matter how cold it gets out there. Keep having fun.