Guest Post: A Simple Exercise Writers Can Use to Stir Their Imaginations
About The Author:
Lauren Bannon is a writer, editor, and communications professional based in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. However, her story began in Washington state where she earned a BA degree from the University of Washington’s English Literature and Language Program. Both her fiction and articles have been published in various journals and have been featured as guest posts across the web. Please visit laurenbannon.ca to view her portfolio.
As a writer, being uninspired is one of the most awful feelings.
There's nothing worse than sitting down in front of your computer, intending to create something stellar but instead sitting there motionless, unmotivated, and unimaginative. With the current climate of a pandemic-ridden world and our day-to-days being limited, my inspiration often feels at arm's length. I'd go so far as to say it's over two metres at length. (I'm sorry, I'll let myself out...)
When I feel uninspired, I have a go-to activity that I refer to as "sketching." This isn't a guide on how to draw. The sketching I'm referring to is a written variation, and it has saved me from many panicked moments of not delivering.
The activity can be done from anywhere: your office, your living room, or if you need a break from your scenery, take it to the coffee shop or park. And it's not just for content creators; this exercise is for anyone who needs to stretch those mental muscles in order to get a project started.
Start by finding a subject. If you're in your home office, take a look out your window, look at a painting on your wall, or use modern technology and enter a subject into your preferred search engine and browse the picture results until one piques your interest. If you're in, let's say, a coffee shop, use the man reading a book a few tables down or the barista behind the counter.
The sole requirement is to find a subject, and give it some focus. If it's a real person that you don't know, I do suggest being discreet. If you're not discreet, things can get weird.
Next, give the subject a personality. The personality you give them doesn't have to be accurate. For example, if the person you’re focusing on is a familiar co-worker, your description doesn't have to be spot on. I encourage you to use pure imagination. List the things that you, from seeing the subject in your mind's eye, imagine them to be like.
What's their temperament? Are they timid? What's their lifestyle? Are they just getting by? Are they opulent? Are they content? Lonely? Are they angry right now? Do they have a quirk, like a twitch or an aversion to certain sounds? List until you have a good foundation of who your subject is.
Now, use your subject's surroundings and create a situation for them.
The keyword here is to create. The guy at the cafe reading a book a few tables down isn't reading it because he's a bookworm and the book is highly recommended. He's reading this book to get over his shyness because there's a loud-mouth at his office who seems to always have a leg up on him because his social skills are better. Make it up, get your wheels turning. If you're in your home office using your computer image, you get to challenge your imagination even further.
Now it’s time to sketch. Take the subject and all their traits, take the surroundings and the situation, and use it to capture a moment. Generate some fiction. The moment doesn't need an ending. The moment doesn't need to be lengthy. It needs to be a detailed description backed by your groundwork and nothing more.
Let's take the man reading the book in the café, for example:
He frequents this café often. Its close to his office where he has worked for over 15 years as a junior associate. For years he has been trying to climb the ladder to a senior position, working late nights, putting all his effort into his projects to the detriment of his family (his daughter will never forgive him for all the volleyball games he has missed), ignoring his own health by eating food on the go just so he doesn't miss a moment of dedication.
But no matter what, all his efforts go amiss because he is morbidly under spoken. For instance, when he was asked to share the data from his last project at a luncheon with the attendance of only five colleagues, he froze, he stumbled, and it went so unwell that his colleagues gently ended the luncheon to save themselves from having to cringe any further. The last promotion he had his eye on went to Karl, a loud-mouthed younger colleague who has no skill, no brain, but who does possess charisma for days.
The man finally made a decision: he wasn't going to let his hang-up be his downfall any longer. After hours of research, he finally found the perfect book. It promised he wouldn't be shy anymore; it promised that after spending $18.95 and reading it cover to cover, all his dreams would come true. This was his moment, and he wasn't going to miss it.
See? Short. Just a moment.
After this activity, I begin to find inspiration for everything put on my plate. My brain feels open and the adrenaline of having created something motivates me. I hope it inspires some of you as well. Try it to escape a mental slump or even just to pass a few moments of boredom. Improve on it.
Your writing level does not matter — this is for you and you alone. But if you do try it and are willing, I'd love to read your sketch. I'd love to experience your moment.
