X marks the spot

Ah, a lovely view. Just the kind of thing my muse enjoys, particularly when she spots that stegosaurus-looking thing on the ground.

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What do you think you would find if you had a chance to explore? 

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J is for Jog

No, I'm not talking about jogging. I don't do that if I can help it (when we first moved to Berlin, my son thought people only ran to catch a bus).

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I'm talking about jogging your mind, jostling your muse, getting the creative juices flowing.  How? Go for a jog. Or a walk, a bike ride, a run. Get out of the house/office, get some fresh air (avoid city streets; if you're deep in thought, you might as well wear a target for muggers, not to mention the hazards of crossing if you're not really paying attention to traffic).

Aside from the obvious health benefits of physical activity, it enhances creativity.

You don't have to go for a hard run or spend an hour at the gym. Moderate activity (a brisk walk) stimulates creative function in the brain immediately after you finish the activity AND for a good two hours after. (For real: check this out.)

Wrestling with an idea? Haven't seen your muse in a while? Go for a walk (jog, run, bike ride) when you'll have some time to write afterward. When I'm struggling, I sit down to write in my journal after a walk, and the problems, more often than not, resolve themselves.

And your back will thank you.

How do you overcome creative block?

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Assigning Blame

It's all Suzanne Collins' fault. Yep, you  read that right. My muse is missing, and I hold Suzanne completely responsible.

My muse was happily coming up with all kinds of wonderful stuff, feeding my brain lots of lovely ideas. Life was good in creativity land.

And then I started reading Catching Fire. It consumed me. Pulled me into another world, where I worried about Katniss, and Peeta, and Gale. Even when I wasn't reading the book.

Cooking dinner: thought about the wild game Katniss caught.
Heard jays squabble: thought of mockingjays.
Tried to think of my own work: couldn't get the plight of the people in the Districts out of my head.

Suzanne Collins, with her extraordinary ability to transport me to another time and place, chased my muse away. So, really, my lack of productivity must be her fault, right?

Do you think my muse will return when I finish reading Mockingjay? I certainly hope so. I'm off to find out.

What books transport you into another world?

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Finding your top idea

By Reg Lynch; The Sydney Morning Herald

I haven't had poetry popping into my head of late. I think it's because I've been focusing on writing prose, in the form of a MG novel. My head can only deal with one writing format at a time.

I had noticed that poems almost always popped into my head while I was in the shower or just after getting out of the shower. For a while I thought the poetry muse liked the bathroom, in general (maybe because it's the one place where I get a few minutes to myself?). Then I thought it might be the hair dryer (lots of ideas came then, too).

But the poetry muse has been very quiet of late, and I've had other things popping in my head, like the idea for my entry into the weather blogfest. That scene quite literally appeared in my mind while I was in the shower. One could argue that water raining down on me triggered it, but I don't think that's it. You see, I had been thinking quite a lot about the weather.

(Lamenting it, really... I love a good thunderstorm, and the weather where I live is monotonous. Day in and day out of the same thing. It's either weeks of sun without a cloud in the sky, weeks of gray clouds without a hint of sun, or weeks of rain. Where I grew up, we got a little bit of everything every single day. The monotony makes me crazy.)

Paul Graham (software developer, programmer, investor, and all-around highly successful creative person) argues that whatever you think about in the shower is the top idea in your mind. It's the thing your brain is playing with, turning over, working at from various angles. It's the problem you will solve. The light bulb flash that will come to you out of the blue. The solution may not come then, but whatever you are contemplating in the shower is what consumes the neuronal pathways in your brain.

Rather exciting idea, really. Like being handed the keys to the kingdom. But it comes with warning: "be careful what you let become critical to you. Try to get yourself into situations where the most urgent problems are ones you want to think about." I think we could broaden this to say, try to get yourself into situations where your creative projects (or serious problems that require solving) are the things you think about.

Obsessing over a negative critique you received? You're not alone, it happens to the best of us (see Graham's Top Idea article for more about how it affected Isaac Newton). But perhaps the most selfish thing you can do for yourself is to let it go.

Nothing can be done to change it. All you do is damage yourself by carefully plotting out the various ways you could inflict pain (real or psychological) on the offender. Satisfying in the short-term. Detrimental over the long-term.

Wouldn't it be more satisfying to let it go, free your brain to come up with something that fixes the flaws, and carry out the new idea? To succeed by overcoming the problems so-and-so highlighted for you? I think so.

What was your top idea today? And how do you keep your mind focused on the ideas you want to think about?

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Insomnia

Okay, summer is officially here. Like, in the 90s (30s if you're not American) here. No air conditioning, just open windows and fans to keep the air moving.  Not ideal weather for sleeping.

I've become a major insomniac of late. Partly due to the heat, partly due to the fact that I'm a light sleeper (as soon as one of the kids coughs or says something in his sleep, I'm awake), and partly due to the fact that the sun officially clears the horizon at 4:45, but dawn begins around 3. Birds don't have clocks. They don't care that it is FAR TOO EARLY to be singing (or that nesting is over and done with, therefore they have no reason to sing). There is a hint of light, so they sing. Right outside our bedroom window. Close the window... stifling air... insomnia.

My problem is that my head is full of ideas. This sounds like it should be a good thing, but all it takes is a little cough to wake me, and then CLICK the gears start to turn. It's as though my muse perches on the pillow next to my head, waiting for me to come to the surface long enough to dive in through my ear and get to work. Suddenly, my head is full of story ideas, characters (had a little girl with glasses pop up the other night), plot lines, and even what to write about in the blog.

I get up and write things down, but it doesn't help. My brain just won't shut down. Even though it means I can't write as well the next day (when it's even hotter and all I want to do is take a nap), my muse brain refuses to listen to reason.

So I comfort myself by making use of the time by playing "what if". I think up all of the crazy directions a story could go, and (for the most part) clear out the ones that just won't work. Sadly (sad because I like to sleep), I'm usually awake long enough to get to my 20th idea (thanks to Maureen Crisp for the link).

My goal is to put all of those wonderful nocturnal ideas to good use over the rest of the summer, before classes (i.e. teaching duties) resume in the fall. If only I could write as quickly as the ideas come. We shall see what comes of it.

What about you? What do you do when you can't sleep?

Nurturing the muse

I have been wondering, lately, where my muse was hiding all those years when I lived in a creative desert. I think it was afraid of the TV.

I've never been one to watch TV for hours on end, but I was in the habit of having it on for "company" when I lived alone. Later, after I met my husband, we used to eat dinner in front of the venerable boob tube. I am embarrassed to say that this persisted until we had kids.

Looking back, it's really no wonder my hobbies and creative pursuits fell by the wayside. My muse had been beaten into submission by an onslaught of visual and auditory stimulation that was (for the most part) anything but stimulating.* Numbed by the programs, my poor brain couldn't come up with a creative thought. Didn't need to, when the advertisements told me what I should eat, drink, and wear.

Yes, I'm being snarky, but I really think TV had a lot to do with my time in the creative desert. Why? Because when we moved to Germany, we got rid of the TV** (in reality, it is sitting in storage in the US and we are paying ridiculous amounts of money for a giant, out-of-date paperweight we will never use again—free TV anyone?).

When we got to Germany, my muse peeped its tousled head out to look with sleepy eyes at the world around it. It saw all kinds of wonderful and began to knit those little strands of detail together to make a tapestry. One that tells a story. Several, actually.

Now, my muse seems to have a bit of ADD, but maybe that's from all of those TV shows. I'm still nurturing it. It's shy, but it gets a little bolder every day.

What's your muse like? What kinds of experiences stimulate your muse?

* some shows are very thought-provoking, but I think it is easy for us to be lulled into a sense of complacency by the vast majority of programs
** we do have a TV, but it's not connected to anything but the DVD player, which we use about once a week