Inspiration

Inspiration, for me, has always come natural in creative writing. Some consider it luck however, I really must reiterate the extensive knowledge I hold on mythology and folklore. Seeing how many stories have been reiterated in tv shows and cartoons growing up and the examples of artists and writers making it their own. There are moments I do not feel…worthy enough of writing or I get in a slump due to my ADHD (more on that in a future post). For me, inspiration works a little bit more like faith from time to time. I have faith that the inspiration I receive when I receive it is because I am now able to understand it and receiving it any sooner may have perverted the idea that I carry into fruition. Inspiration is a difficult subject for many artistically minded people and some have a hard time working it out for themselves, so let us start where we all dreadfully go from time to time as creatives and that is writer's block/ creative block.

I was once asked the question ‘How do you get yourself out of a block’. It really goes back to my post on Purpose. I really do interact with my own child self. You see I feel connected to my younger self more closely the more I get creative, as my younger self has a much smaller world and the wonderment is much larger. The cares of the adult life are washed away almost and I can focus on endless creation without working myself up to caring what an audience may think and explore the idea further till I am much happier with it fitting where I need it to, in my rainstorm of a writing technique (more on that in a second). I am innocent of the rules that are taught to me from studying writing and the examples I have learned from the greats and form ideas that were inspired by others and work on making them my own. I really put myself in my mind back at Sandburg Elementary School’s playground. There was a tree me and my buddies used to go to and play our Game Boys on weekends from time to time. That same tree was where I would sit and ponder as a child or people watch on occasion during recess. To all that know Sandburg, it is the largest tree by the Red Structure. I put myself back in that classroom where I first felt enjoyment of others from something I had written and I let the weight of adulthood lift from me creatively. I either envision it in my mind, or make trips and go back to that school physically and picture my childhood there to recharge once in a while. I also work on keeping my workspace clean. Mental blockages can heavily come from your surroundings. The hardest part of transitioning from In-Office work to Work From Home status this past year was that my creative space now is equally shared with my day job space. This was a very hard hurdle to overcome, and hopefully in the future it will not be an issue and I have my own designated writing space vs workspace. A lot of the time I also wear my sound canceling headphones, not to play music, but to have the deadening sound block other outside distractions. This was discovered by accident; As a common thing for me and my ADHD is listening to music, specific playlists with specific moods I want to feel as I write. The playlist tends to end and I get in a flow. I forget to move on to another playlist or what have you and I am just there writing with sound being blocked from myself. Over time that deadening sound that comes from my headphones has almost worked as a trigger to get me into a mood of writing. Many things can contribute to writer's block and for me it seems to be the same almost all the time. That is I will have a scene/ scenario I have written out keeps playing in my mind. It’s stuck in there almost like a sickness. Well I obviously have an issue with that scene. So I back track from there to find where I may have over thought my way out of a great idea and may have gone down the wrong path creatively. 10/10 times I will find that exact spot and rewrite from there to ensure that rain droplet’s ripple leads into my next raindrops ripple juuust right. And what do I mean by that?

I write like rain falls. I do not have a linear mind, but I can remember things linear exceedingly well. Creatively and organizationally I am all over the place. So starting out with my creative writing projects, such as Descendants Rising, I was too focused on writing linearly because that’s what I thought needed to be done. After a good year of building the world in my head, its characters, who they were, what they believed in, where they lived, how big was the ‘map’ I am dealing with so on and so on, I started writing individual scenarios. I write parts of my story all over the place and I adjust how they fit into the overall story over time. Think of a scenario as a water droplet, and when it hits the puddle, it creates a ripple. That ripple can move out in all directions but what other raindrops (scenario) ripple will or SHOULD it hit first to make a more cohesive story. So I no longer fixate on writing linearly. I form better connections that connect the droplets by filling in great stories and those are my ripples, that filler bit that makes it all connect. I apologize if some of you are confused but that is just how my mind works.

Inspiration for me really does come from anywhere based on what my art is. Creative writing is an outlet of my active imagination and creating scenarios in my head. I, myself, do not have anxiety, but I heavily encourage anyone with anxiety to get into creative writing as it seems like a wonderful place to start relaxing the thought diarrhea most people with anxiety go through. The scenario creations that I get alone from being at a bar can be too much fun. You and your buddy are simply having a drink. But for me if I see a home across the way from where I am sitting, I can imagine I am in a world where I am planning a heist and this casual spot is the steak out point. I really start to work my mind in a cinematic way that plays out to where I try to rob this house in my head. Another example, standing and talking with a friend outside on the side walk out front of his home, a man across the street is walking his dog, the man ends up being some cop and lets his dog. one of us runs off the other stays down on the ground. The dog may not be a German Shepard, but in my mind I will correct that and have the scene play out. That's the start of my movie and now the main character is in prison years later just getting out and he wants to reconnect with his buddy he had not heard from while being locked up. He finally finds his friend and he has a leg injury from the dog for the rest of his life and the story can be them helping find closure. I get creative as I sonder on my drive around towns, especially at night. The connections I could have made living in this other town and what my life would have been like looking up at the stars there instead of my original home town. Creating scenarios in my head. This started to become an exercise for me from watching Yu Yu Hakusho as a child. The first episode (spoiler alert) he dies and travels around as a ghost the rest of the day seeing his family and flying from home to home. Just that sense of being able to witness life and him trying to help others in that form and succeeding. Another example is an episode of Dragonball Z , where Gohan teaches Videl to fly. As a child, that faith of creativity and how many others I connect with remember that wonderment from that same episode on “What If It Were Possible” is shared. That faith can be dedicatedly written into one's work. The possibilities are endless and I always felt I had been an ideal man.

For more inspiration, try to find a group that you can start or join. I have a really really good feeling with a buddy that together with him and I can create a very nice creative writing circle. This way you get into those headspaces to meet once a week, or every other week, to express yourself outward and vocally on what you are working on. If words are wind and wind is power then you must work on being around or forming a group of like minded people to get you to vocalize your ideas. I hope this circle can grow creatively and I know something big will come from it. So if you are interested, by all means reach out to me and let me know! For now, though, this will be it. I am sure I will touch more on inspiration in the future and I would love to hear some ideas from you guys in the comments on how you stay creative! Thanks as always, till next time!