Hi all Just wondered what random times of the day (or night) that your best ideas strike you? Mine always seem to come when i am driving, usually too or from work which is highly annoying as i have to pull over to jot them down in my notepad! I think i might have to invest in a dictaphone or something!! What about the rest of you? Its interesting that most good ideas come to you, while you're doing something completely unrelated to writing, like walking round Tesco!!
I can't count the number of times a wonderful song has come to me when I'm driving. I usually sing when I'm driving, and I sometimes just grab a random melody and go with it, and it turns into something beautiful, and then I forget it before I can record it or write it down! Aargh. Ideas for stories are a bit different. As I've said here before, my stories usually start with characters and situations that just flash into my head, then it's a matter of discovery writing to find out what these characters are all about. The stories grow from the characters. These character ideas come to me any time of day or night, but once they're in my head, I don't forget them. I don't lose stories because I didn't have a chance to write down a character description, for instance. The character is locked into my head in a flash, and I write to let him out, so to speak. The story grows with the writing.
Ha! I thought I was the only one. Mine also happen when I'm trying to go to sleep. I turn off the light a brilliant scene that demmands attention - I turn on the light write it out then go - enough! Turn off the light. Begin to chuckle another scene is coming - I turn on the light and so on. But ideas flood me at all times. It annoys people I'm with cause my mind is usually elsewhere. I watch people in a restaurant, boom an idea. It's all in seeing beyond something. Not seeing surfacely but allowing everything to be filtered through your imagination. Like when you were a kid and saw prancing unicorns in clouds.
I don't drive, but sometimes ideas come to me while I'm walking. Or, like someone already mentioned, in the shower. Or while I'm doing some chores (but I usualy try and avoid them, so this doesn't happen a lot). Whatever keeps me in some kind of movement but leaves my mind free to roam. Just sitting down and thinking "Oh, now I could start working on some great idea" doesn't work somehow.
For a long time, I haven't had this feeling. I'm still stuck with an idea I had 7 years ago, nothing new has come up after that. I wonder why.
My problem is I get too many ideas, thats why I have to write different novels simulatenously, to keep them all somewhat clean. I get the most juicy ideas from dreams at night, because when I dream its always so complex that I can dream whole stories
You don't have to write all of them simultaneously. If you get too many ideas, just note down the new ones and concentrate on one or two.
24/7 i keep a notepad and pen on the bed, as i often get ideas 'in my sleep' and jot them down while they're hot... dreamt a the start of a screenplay once... 10 days later, i had a full script written, never having written a screenplay before...
When I do anything else other than write. Like when I shower, or tend to my birds, or wash dishes, and when I walk outside in cold weather.
F'rinstance: I was out to dinner with a group of writer friends and three among us recounted that journal, poetry, or fiction that included some reference to dragons. I commented that this must be the night of the dragons. That immediately segued into "The Night of the Dragons" as the title of a work of fiction - either fantasy or some martial arts, Jackie Chan/Bruce Lee/Crouching Tiger kind of a tale. Or maybe some mystery or cop/drug story. I still haven't decided yet but that is definitely such a great title that I will most certainly have to smooth it out. I'm leaning toward a drugs/murder story. But that's the way ideas come. You never know what will trigger that one idea in your head. You just stay open to it. Right, Nee?
My ideas come to me in many unusual ways sometimes when i am reading a book something in that book wil cause a story idea to pop into my brain, other times i might be watching a movie and some scene in that movie will spark an idea, or maybe when i am doing a certain task and something about that task will cause an idea to spark.
@Richardclayton, Honestly, I get them just about anytime of the day and night, that's why I keep my cellphone within arms reach at most times. Most cellphones have a recorder intergrated in them. Once a month, I download all my ideas onto my pc and take my time editing. You should try it, it sure beats a notepad and a pen
