Ian Dawson's Blog, page 4

Writing Tip of the Week: Exploring Public Domain Media

It’s the start of a new year, so it’s time for a fresh crop of books, plays, short stories, images, audio, and films to enter the public domain. Why is this important? It means there are hundreds of ideas available to adapt and bring new life to if you’re looking for an interesting story or concept that already exists.

Maybe you’re looking for a story to adapt for your next screenplay or short film. Perhaps you’re a novelist who wants to experiment with a new genre or story structure. You might find an image that generates ideas for a new story. Or, maybe you’re interested in finding plot elements that have been used before but want to find a unique way to use them for a new story.

This public domain catalog is a fun place to start.

Here are some tips to keep in mind if you find something that piques your creative interest:

Check the Date

Copyrights lapse on different versions and editions of books, short stories, and films, but a later version might be under copyright protection. To protect yourself, ensure your version is still in the public domain.

What Version is Under Public Domain?

Winnie the Pooh, Popeye, and Mickey Mouse have fallen into the public domain over the last few years, but if you plan to use them, you must know what version of each character is now in the public domain.

There are specific designs of these characters that are free for you to use, so you must do your homework so you aren’t met with a cease-and-desist letter when your work is out to the world.

Inspiration for the Imagination

You may find a book in the public domain with a compelling premise or several compelling plot elements that inspire you to write a different story using these elements. That’s great, too, and shows how you can use these public domain properties as a springboard for your creative endeavors.

The same could happen with a drawing, painting, or photo in the public domain that inspires a new story idea based on the events in the image.

Final Thoughts

The public domain is a vast wonderland of media that can be overwhelming but can also spark creative ideas that empower you as you develop your next story idea. Have fun exploring this vast archive and see what inspires you!

Happy Exploring, and I’ll see you next time!

Five Ways to Set Writing Goals for 2025

We’re in the final days of 2024, and if you haven’t thought about your writing or creative goals for 2025, now would be a good time. It’s essential to establish a few goals as we enter the new year so you can plan how to achieve them before the end of the upcoming year.

Let’s talk about it!

#1 - Set Achievable Goals

This seems logical, but it’s easy to get carried away and overreach with your goals at the start of the year. Much like the classic New Year’s Resolution, if you aim too high, you could grow frustrated and stop working toward your chosen goal if it’s too large.

If you’ve never written a novel before and want that to be your primary goal this coming year, that’s great. That’s an achievable goal. Then, once you know the steps and how to achieve writing one novel, you can add more goals the following year. The key is not to overwhelm yourself or self-sabotage before the goal starts.

#2 - What’s Your Schedule?

Along with setting achievable goals, it’s important to look at your schedule to see how much time you have to work toward your writing goals.

Be honest with yourself: How much time do you actually have to get things done?

Assess your schedule and see where you can fit writing time during the week. Plenty of hours are available to all of us, most of which are spent on our phones, binge-watching shows, or wasting time in other ways. Using these wasted hours and turning them into productive time to create can help you move toward your goals.

Can you swap out watching an hour of TV for working on your writing? Yes, you can.

If you have the drive to do it, you’ll find the time to make it happen.

#3 - Break It All Down

Planning out smaller tasks and aspects of the project that add up to a larger goal can help you stay focused and reduce stress. All projects have dozens of components that must be completed before the finished product is achieved.

When you sit down to plan, think about the varied tasks you can work on daily or weekly to help you move forward with the project and complete it by the end of the year. Having a big goal is excellent; smaller goals over time are the best way to reach it.

#4 - Set Milestones

Give yourself deadlines to reach specific project milestones. By breaking the work into manageable chunks, you can see where you’ll be in the project three, six, or nine months in advance.

Could you complete your novel's outline in three months, a first draft by the six-month mark, and a polished draft within nine months? Absolutely. These are achievable goals, but you need to plan out how you will reach these milestones.

It’s also important to reward yourself when each milestone is completed. Even if it’s something small, it’s nice to incentivize yourself to get things done.

#5 - Enjoy the Process

It’s easy to look at all the completed novels and screenplays and get intimidated, but remember that all these writers started where you are right now.

Completing a writing project is a great feeling, but you must train yourself to enjoy the writing and creative process to keep that momentum going to get you to the finished work. This will ensure you are motivated to attack your projects and goals each day and that your milestones and writing objectives are completed.

Happy Goal-setting, and I’ll see you next time!

Home Alone Plot Structure – Part Three

We have arrived at the final act of Home Alone. Act Three of any story is the shortest since the story is wrapping up, and the plot should arrive at a resolution.

In the last post, we left Kevin being surprised by Harry and Marv as he opened the basement door at his neighbor’s house.

Is it curtains for Kevin?

HOME ALONE - ACT THREE

An enraged Harry and Marv finally catch the devious 8-year-old who caused them so much trouble throughout the evening. The battle-scarred duo tells Kevin their plans to do to him what his traps did to them.

Unknown to them, their plans will never happen.

We’re entering what’s known as…

Climax/Obligatory Scene: “third-act final showdown between Hero and Adversary that resolves the main plot question once and for all” (Edson 137).

At 1:30:18, Marley arrives and knocks Marv and Harry unconscious with his snow shovel, then picks Kevin up and takes him home.

But wait. Isn’t the story's hero supposed to save the day and defeat the bad guys? Yes. Kevin wins the day since he has already called the police before escaping his house and running to the Murphy’s. It was lucky for Kevin that Marley arrived, but the cops would’ve shown up anyway and arrested Harry and Marv, which means Kevin’s actions resolved the story.

We watch from Kevin’s point of view as the Wet Bandits—spelled W-A-T by Marv – are arrested and driven away by the cops.

Now, there’s one more story thread to tie up, which brings us to the…

Denouement: “wraps up the plot loose ends and relationships” (Edson 137).

At 1:35:51, Kevin and his mom resolve their previous conflict and hug it out. Then, the rest of the family arrives home and is amazed by Kevin’s ability to survive independently. We get a nice emotional moment when Marley reunites with his family before Buzz yells, “Kevin! What did you do to my room?” and the movie ends.

It’s a tidy finale for all the chaos that’s transpired, and I’ve always wondered how long it took Kevin to clean and repair all the damage to the house.

Final Thoughts

As writers, it’s important to remember the importance of plot and plot elements that help keep the story moving and create conflict and drama for your hero. Kevin definitely drives the action in Home Alone, and his antagonists, Harry and Marv, get what they deserve by the story’s end.

What did you come up with for your plot elements for Home Alone? Were they similar to mine or different? Leave a comment and let me know your thoughts.

Happy Holidays, and I’ll see you next time!

Writing Exercise of the Week: Watch Home Alone

In my last post, we discussed the plot elements of crafting a compelling story. These included utilizing the traditional three-act structure and its components to ensure the plot and main character are active and moving toward their intended goal.

The Assignment

I want you to watch Home Alone and see if you can identify the following plot elements as they happen involving Kevin:

ACT ONE

Inciting Incident: “a single event that either happens directly to the protagonist or is caused by the protagonist” (McKee 190).

Plot Point/Stunning Surprise 1: “the arrival of some event or dramatic reversal that creates a moment of shock for the Hero and drops the curtain on the first act – while immediately raising is again on the second act” (Edson 118).

ACT TWO

Mid-Point Sequence: “The Hero reaches a Point of No Return beyond which turning back is no longer an option…Conflict with the Adversary becomes deeply personal…A ‘ticking clock’ time limit is set in motion…An unmasking takes place, literally or figuratively, and an inner truth gets revealed” (Edson 219-220).

Plot Point/Stunning Surprise 2: “comes out of the blue and changes everything. It signals the end of Act Two and the beginning of Act Three…frequently the primary additional punch of Stunning Surprise #2 is that it completely destroys the Hero’s plan for victory and announces that sweeping improvisation will now be required for the Hero to have any chance of besting the Adversary” (Edson 129).

ACT THREE

Climax/Obligatory Scene: “third-act final showdown between Hero and Adversary that resolves the main plot question once and for all” (Edson 137).

Denouement: “wraps up the plot loose ends and relationships” (Edson 137).

Grab a piece of paper, and as you watch, list what you feel best fits each plot element. Remember: only Kevin’s actions and the plot elements related to him matter in this exercise since he is the main character.

Next Time…

In my next series of posts, we’ll explore these elements as they relate to Home Alone and see if what you picked is the same as what I chose.

Happy Viewing, and I’ll see you next time!

Sources:

Edson, Eric. The Story Solution. Michael Wiese Productions, 2011.

McKee, Robert. Story. Harper Collins, 1997.

Writing Tip of the Week: What is Story?

Every day, we are surrounded by fiction and non-fiction stories. They are part of the human experience and have the power to shape who we are as individuals and alter the views of the masses. Stories are how we communicate good and bad information and channel empathy, sympathy, and connection with others.

We seem to know and understand what a story is from childhood, and our hunger for story only grows over time. Often, we go from being told stories to being the storyteller, which harkens back to ancient cultures and communities.

But what exactly defines a story, and how does it differ from the concept of plot?

Story Defined

Think of a story as a completed puzzle. There are hundreds of pieces involved that interlock to create a finished picture, and a story is similar in design. As John Truby writes, “a story is made of subsystems like the characters, the plot, the revelations sequence, the story world, the moral argument,” and many other elements to complete the full picture of a story (Truby 9).

Most stories have a singular focus, concentrating on the action of a main character for the majority of the story, which is “expecting a useful reaction from [their] world, but instead the effect of [their] action is to provoke forces of antagonism. The world of the character reacts differently than expected, more powerfully than expected, or both” (McKee 144-145). Having this focal character in a story helps the audience identify and connect with them so they have someone to keep track of as the story unfolds. They are the audience’s proxy within the world of the story.

So, a story provides us with the entire roadmap of events that will unfold on our hero’s journey. It comprises many events and elements that combine to create a complete narrative for an audience to follow and connect with. These elements weave around each other, giving the story more depth, meaning, and conflict.

Story Design

A story has structure. Simply put, a story has a beginning, a middle, and an end.

When you tell a story about something that happened to you, it follows these basic principles. A fictional story should as well; our brains expect and even crave this type of uniform structure when it comes to storytelling. It’s one of the reasons why some people get upset when a story ends on a cliffhanger and nothing is resolved.

Robert McKee states, “A story is a design in five parts: The Inciting Incident, the first major event of the telling, is the primary cause for all that follows, putting into motion the other four elements – Progressive Complications, Crisis, Climax, Resolution” (McKee 181). We crave these elements and even subconsciously expect them to exist in whatever story we’re being told. We’ve all either been told a story or seen a movie where nothing seems to happen, which frustrates us. That’s because we are conditioned to need these story elements to enjoy the story we are seeing or hearing.

Western storytelling employs the traditional Three-Act Structure, which I’ll explain in an upcoming post. This structure encapsulates all the conventional elements that audiences expect.

Stories & Communication

Stories have a purpose. They have a reason for existing and a reason why they are told. Even if the storyteller is the only one who truly understands the story's meaning, the transmission of the story from storyteller to audience increases its overall meaning and connection with others. A story can connect with an audience when it “expresses the dramatic code” (Truby 7). This underlying “dramatic code, embedded deep in the human psyche, is an artistic description of how a person can grow and evolve. This code is also a process going on underneath every story. The storyteller hides this process beneath particular characters and actions” (Truby 7).

We can feel this dramatic code as we listen, watch, or read. It’s how a story connects with an audience on a deeper level, drawing them in and keeping them mesmerized throughout.

We’ve all encountered stories that make us ask, “What was the point of that?” To have a lasting impact on an audience, a story must have a purpose and meaning beyond the surface level.

Final Thoughts

As humans, we crave stories. They are integral to our daily lives and help create meaning and understanding of our world. Stories are an amalgamation of dozens of smaller elements that come together to form a completed story that delivers a beginning, middle, and end that keeps the audience engaged and intrigued from start to finish. Through this structure, we connect and empathize with main characters and can follow their trials and tribulations as they succeed or fail.

Next Time…

So, if story includes everything, what exactly is plot? We’ll explore that in the next post!

Sources:

McKee, Robert. Story. Harper Collins, 1997.

Truby, John. The Anatomy of Story. Faber and Faber, 2007.

Five Ways to Plan Your 2025 Reading Challenge

It’s hard to believe, but 2024 is winding down, and 2025 is quickly approaching. With all the other end-of-year/start-of-year events, I thought now would be a good time to discuss ways to plan a reading challenge for yourself in 2025.

Over the last two weeks, I’ve talked about why it’s important to read books, and challenging yourself to read a certain number of books over the course of a year is a great way to stay motivated and keep reading. Let’s talk about five ways to plan your reading schedule for 2025 and ensure you meet your goal before 2026!

#1 - How Much Time Do You Have?

If you have a busy schedule and your free time is filled with errands and other activities, keep your reading goal small. I recommend planning to read six to eight books over the year, seeing how that goes, and then extending the amount moving forward.

If you have time to binge-watch seasons of TV in one weekend, you have time to read more. I suggest attempting to read 12 or more books during 2025. One book a month may sound daunting, but you'll quickly reach your goal once you get into the reading rhythm.

#2 - What Counts as a Book?

Reading a book to your kids? That counts. Like comic books? Those count. Reading for class? Yep, textbooks or other assigned readings count. If you prefer digital to paper, eBooks count as well.

Don’t be afraid to include all types of books and reading material in your reading challenge. You’ll find that you’ll read much more during the year than you initially thought.

#3 - Is Listening to Books Okay?

Around this time each year, I see people on social media announce they have read 300+ books, and I often wonder how that’s possible. Then it dawned on me: audiobooks! Yes, these 100% count as books read over the year, and if you can listen to them on your commute, at work, at home, or anywhere else, you can knock out a lot of books in 365 days.

If this is a more viable option for you and fits your lifestyle, go for it!

#4 – Make a Game Plan

Once you decide how many books you’d like to tackle in 2025, determine what you plan to read. Things can change over the year, but having a list of books you want to work through beforehand will set you up for success.
Maybe there’s an author you enjoy that you’d like to read more from. Or maybe it’s a genre you’re curious about. Perhaps a non-fiction topic piques your interest or a historical period.

Alternate between physical books, eBooks, and audiobooks, or stick to one medium for the whole year.

Or, maybe you’re like me, with more books than space, and you need to read through what you have!

Whatever you decide, it’s always good to have a basic idea of what you want to read over the next year so you don’t have to guess what’s next. It’s okay to change things if another book interests you, but having other books ready to read is helpful.

#5 – Track It

You can do it on your own with a list on your computer or paper, or you can use one of many reading tracking apps or sites like www.goodreads.com, where you can join their annual reading challenge and write and post reviews of the books you read throughout the year.

These reading challenge trackers also tell you how many books you have left to go and how many books you are ahead or behind in your stated challenge.

Other apps include Bookly, Bookmory, StoryGraph, TBR, and many others you can check out on your phone’s app store.

Final Thoughts

I’m a huge fan of reading, and I want as many people worldwide to read and enjoy books as much as I do. Challenge yourself to read as many books as you’d like throughout 2025 and be amazed by how much you read and learn from January 1 to December 31!

Happy Reading, and I’ll see you next time!

6 Reasons Reading Books Still Matters – Part One

Reading books doesn’t seem as popular as it used to be. Although there are millions of books available, I keep meeting people who have no interest in sitting down and reading a novel or even nonfiction about a topic that interests them.

According to the National Literacy Institute, “44% of the American adults do not read a book in a year,” and “130 million adults are now unable to read a simple story to their children.”* These are shocking and unfortunate statistics but fixable in the modern age. With our interconnected world, accessing books and other reading materials is easier than ever, yet millions lack interest in picking up a book and reading.

What are some reasons to encourage people to read books? What is the value of reading a few books a year? Let’s talk about it!

But first, let’s get in the mood with the theme song from the excellent series Reading Rainbow!

Reading Rainbow Theme

# 1 – You’re In Control

Many people abandon reading after graduating from high school or college. They are burned out on reading assignments involving dry literature, bland textbooks, and the associated essays and tests. This creates a negative association between reading and the reader; the very thought of opening a book for pleasure makes them cringe in horror.

But post-school, you are in control of what you read. You can read whatever types of books you want on any topic. No looming deadlines, tests, or essays are linked to your reading. With the absence of this pressure and your freedom to choose, you can read in a relaxed mental state and enjoy the experience.

#2 – Increase Attention Span

A relative of mine revealed that they can no longer finish listening to a song on YouTube without getting bored and turning it off a few minutes in. A song! Our attention spans are shrinking to the length of a TikTok video, which is not good. The fact that news stories tell you how many minutes it’ll take you to read them shows that people choose what information they consume based on duration and not content. That’s crazy!

Books can help resolve this issue. They can help you retrain your brain to concentrate, regain focus, and increase your attention span. Think of improving your attention span like you would train for a marathon. Start with shorter books and work up to the longer ones. Don’t jump into a 1000-page novel, which could discourage or overwhelm you.
Begin with shorter books and increase the page count over time. You’ll find that your focus and concentration on other things in life will also increase.

#3 – Critical Thinking

The nice thing about nonfiction books is that they can inform you about a topic in great detail. Unlike pithy news stories or articles, delving into the meat of an issue is a great way to be informed on that issue. Too often, people let emotions or others dictate how they should think about a topic. Reading a book about it can remedy this situation and help you make informed choices as you become educated on the subject of interest.

Obviously, books can be written with biased views, and we often seek out those who share our views (this is also known as confirmation bias). When choosing a book to read, check out the author’s background and their position on the topic. If they are a writer who has a clear bias toward the topic, you may want to find another book.

I prefer nonfiction books that are as unbiased as possible, giving the reader the power to decide on the topic.

Think about what topics interest you and seek out books that discuss them. Read as many books on the subject as you wish, recognizing the author’s bias and deciding if you agree or disagree with their positions.

Next Time…

Three down, three to go. I’ll have more about why reading books still matters next week!

Happy Reading!

SOURCE: National Literacy Institute

Writing Tip of the Week: Embracing Failure

Everyone fails. It’s true. If you know their name, it’s 100% likely that person has failed at some point in their life and/or career. While we may be presented with a polished, public relations-packaged version of that individual, if you dig into their past, you’ll see they were met with failures and disappointments when starting in their profession.

Failure is a part of life. It’s part of the human experience. How we deal with failure and disappointment can lead to either growth and success or giving up and walking away. It can be hard to work on something for months or years only for it not to gain traction or interest once it’s out in public view. It sucks, but it happens.

While it can be challenging to pull yourself out of the perpetual cycle of despair when failure knocks at your door, you must change your perspective and mindset to utilize failure as a helpful tool rather than a hurtful injury.

When failure strikes, step back and ask why you perceive what’s happened as a failure. Are you measuring your successes and failures against those of others? Are you focused too closely on a specific aspect of your work instead of the bigger picture? What’s stopping you from getting back up and trying again? Are you afraid to fail again? Are you chasing the myth of perfection?

If you wrote and self-published a novel, got it on Amazon and other sites, got some good reviews, and didn’t sell a single copy, is that a failure? I’d say you accomplished more than many others have, and now your work is available to be discovered by others. It may not happen overnight, but you will find readers and an audience over time.

Failure will always exist, but how you deal with and work through it will make a huge difference. Maybe that book didn’t sell, but perhaps the next one will. Or the one after that. Keep writing and putting work out there; eventually, you’ll find an audience.

I once saw an interview with author Dan Brown in which he discussed how poorly his first three novels did when they were first published. Even his agent was baffled that they weren’t doing well. Did he give up and stop writing? No.

His fourth novel, The Da Vinci Code, became an international bestseller. It was then that his previous three novels also became bestsellers. If he had given up, his writing career would have ended with three books, but he didn’t let the failure of the first three stop him. He embraced it, kept working, and motivated himself to write a novel that currently has sold over 80 million copies.

Don’t allow failure to win and dictate what you should and shouldn’t do when being creative. Use your passion, desire, and drive to push through failure, learn from it, and make yourself a stronger writer as a result.
While it’s important to learn from our failures, it’s even more important to accept that those failures are part of the process on the way to success.

Happy Failing, and I’ll see you next time!

Writing Tip of the Week: Driving Your Story Forward

Every story has a unique momentum and pacing. Whether you’re writing a historical romance or a high-octane thriller, keeping the reader engaged and invested in the story and its characters should always be on your mind.

While it’s fun to experiment and go off on tangents and subplots during the drafting process, the final story should be streamlined and pared down to the essential elements so that readers can understand and enjoy your narrative work.

How can you effectively keep your story moving forward? Let’s talk about it!

What’s Relevant?

Every scene or chapter should be relevant and provide important information about the characters or plot. Even subplots should somehow tie into the main story, even if it’s tangentially.

Remember, irrelevant characters, scenes, and storylines should be removed. If they don’t contribute to the overarching story and the main character's goal, they’re unnecessary. By asking yourself, 'If I cut this out, would it be noticeable?' and being willing to let go, you'll maintain control over your story and keep your readers engaged.

Usually, as you read through your completed manuscript, you’ll be able to see these irrelevant aspects and cut them for the good of the story.

Conflict, Conflict, Conflict

Conflict drives a story forward. Whether it is direct or indirect, there should be some level of tension between characters. Even if it’s a minor disagreement, that can be enough to keep things interesting.

It’s okay for friends, lovers, and coworkers to disagree and have conflict. It doesn’t mean they must have a battle royale that results in burning cars and damaged buildings. Minor conflicts help propel the story and the main character forward, allowing the reader to see new dimensions of the protagonist and help us empathize or sympathize with them.

Ratchet Up That Tension!

Similarly, creating tension between two characters can also help drive the story forward. It’s like a rubber band being stretched slowly; anticipating when the tension will snap between two characters can keep the reader locked in to see what will happen when everything comes crashing down.

Rom-coms do this (Will they, or won’t they?). Action movies do this, too (Will they diffuse the bomb in time and save the Senator’s family?). Tension is a great way to keep the reader turning the page and staying up past when they should have gone to bed.

Nothing is a No-No

Have you ever watched a movie and a scene comes on where nothing happens? No conflict. No tension. Noting relevant to the story or characters in the story. It’s just there.

You have two options: 1) Cut it; 2) Fix it.

Ask yourself why the scene is in your story. Should something happen? Should the reader learn something about the main character that will matter later on? Maybe it’s a set-up scene for a payoff later in the story.

Sometimes, I write out a sequence to see how things play out based on an idea I had, and it won’t go anywhere that works in the story. I can quickly cut it out once I see it’s not working.

Remember, your goal is to ensure every chapter and moment in your story delivers important information about the story or the characters. If it does neither, it might be worth removing.

The Sidetrack Trap

Sometimes, you’ll be having so much fun living in the world of your story and its characters that you’ll take detours to see what might happen if they do X, Y, or Z. Since every story you write has unlimited possibilities – after all, you’re its creator – this can be an enticing exercise. But not all sidetracks and detours connect to the main road, and it’s even worse if you know your main character wouldn’t do what you are writing them to do.

Example? As I was drafting my latest novel, The Sexual Misadventures of Alicia Williams, Alpha Female, I thought it would be fun for Alicia and her love interest, Mitch, to go skydiving. Mitch would surprise Alicia with this exciting date, which she knew nothing about. I was writing the scene of them driving to the airfield, and I stopped dead. Based on what had already been established about Alicia, I realized there was no way she would ever get on that plane to jump out of it.

While this would lead to conflict between the two characters, it wasn’t the right place in the story for that to happen, so I dropped the whole sequence. Sometimes, you must take that detour to see if you’re potentially driving your story off a cliff. I definitely would have.

Final Thoughts

Writing a story is often about trial and error. Hundreds of ideas will pass through your imagination and onto the page as you write. Some will work, and some won’t. And that’s okay. The important thing is to get the ideas down on paper and cut out the irrelevant, pointless, and not-so-great ideas during the editing process.

You know your story better than anyone. As you read through your manuscript, you’ll sense where things work, where they lag, and where improvements or cuts need to be made. The key is to do what’s best for the story and its characters, make sure every moment counts, and move the story’s arc and the main character’s arc forward.

Happy Writing, and I’ll see you next time!

Writing Tip of the Week: 5 Ways to Energize Your Writing Routine

Routines are a part of life. We all have our routines and rituals at home and work; most of the time, we’ve done them so often that we do them without thinking. While this is fine for many of our mundane daily activities, it’s always good to shake things up a bit and challenge yourself when it comes to your writing routine.

Here are five ideas you can play around with to energize your writing sessions.

#1 – How Fast in Five?

Set a five-minute timer, then write as fast as you can without stopping until the alarm sounds. Don’t worry about your writing's spelling, grammar, or even logic here. The key is to see how many words you can get on the page in five minutes.

Sometimes, we have a nasty habit of overthinking, preventing us from sitting down to write. This exercise shatters those barriers and allows you to write fast and furious in a short period.

Try this exercise a few times a month and see if you can increase your word count within the five-minute timeframe.

#2 – Changing Genres

It’s great if you have a genre specialty, but sometimes it’s fun to escape the familiar and dabble in the genre you’re not an expert in.

Take two characters from one of your stories and put them in a new genre. Keep their personalities and characteristics the same; the only change is the type of story they’re now a part of. Drop your romantic leads into a haunted house or zombie apocalypse if you write romance. Have a creepy kid in your story? Toss him into your world filled with knitting circles, bake-offs, and town fairs.

Write a chapter or two with them in this new genre and see where your creativity takes you. Who knows. You might discover a new genre you want to explore next!

#3 – The Missing Letter

Pick a commonly used letter from the alphabet and challenge yourself to write a paragraph or two without using that letter. You may have to dig out your thesaurus for this one.

Start with a consonant; then, if you want a more complex challenge, choose a vowel to exclude. For an even bigger challenge, exclude two letters!

We often get stuck using familiar words when we write, so this exercise will push you to seek out different terms and phrases.

#4 – Schedule Shakeup

Change when you write and for how long you write. If you write in the mornings for an hour, try writing in the evenings or at night for 90 minutes. If you write only on weekends, try to squeeze a weekday or two into your routine.

If you can change when you write, play around with how long you write. Write for less time, but try to write the same number of words or pages. Write for longer and increase your word count or page count.

This doesn’t have to be a permanent change, but you may find an extra time of day or block of writing time that increases your productivity. It’s never too late to try a new routine, and you never know how effective these small changes could be.

#5 – Take a Hike

Get out of your everyday writing space and spend that time writing somewhere else. Maybe there’s a café or park near you where you can sit down and write. Perhaps there’s a trail or museum you’ve wanted to explore. Take the day and enjoy the new surroundings, then sit down and write for a while.

Often, a venue change can stimulate new areas of creativity since you’re in a new place with new people and things surrounding you.

Consider doing this a couple of times a month in different locations and see how they impact your creativity.

Final Thoughts

It’s great when you’re in the creative zone and on the path to completing a new project. Sometimes, however, you can get stuck and need some energy to get back on track.

These five exercises are fun ways to stimulate your brain and imagination. Try one or try all five and see if they impact your creativity.

Happy Writing, and I’ll see you next time!