Comments on Bite by bite eats the elephant....: Don't you just hate it when.....

Choose a prompt the night before and literally wak...

2008-05-23T19:10:00.000+01:00

Choose a prompt the night before and literally wake up, stumble to your pen/keyboard and write whatever comes into your head. Doesn't have to flow; just set the timer for ten mins and think of it as a warm-up. It's great as a brain-drain and I finf it best to just scribble in a notepad that no one will ever see.

It won't be genius (every day!) but it'll throw up some interesting nuggets that you can build on or even, in my case, shows what your subconscious is urging you to write about without you even knowing it.

Amazing how the same themes and concepts re-appear time after time.

Good luck! (and sorry about the rambling on)

Hmmm, my only tip is to give yourself full permiss...

2008-05-23T01:45:00.000+01:00

Hmmm, my only tip is to give yourself full permission to write rubbish, and then when the critic pops up, you can tell him it's meant to be crap: that's the whole point. I tell myself this over and over and it does work.

I always bang on about this but I'm a great fan of...

2008-05-22T19:59:00.000+01:00

I always bang on about this but I'm a great fan of what Dorothea Brande called the 'artistic coma'.
You're almost asleep but not quite and you let your mind roam free. If I've got a prompt from the writing group or if there's a particular subject I want to write about, I'll think about it before I lie down. Then, deep relaxation for about 10-20 minutes. If you feel like you're about about to drop off, get up! Once you're fully asleep you've lost it.
The beauty of this is that when you resurface, the thoughts are still fresh in your mind. Get 'em down quick in any order. It may sound hippy dippy but it's surprising what weird things can pop up:-)