'Help! I’ve run out of ideas!'
5 ways to get back to writing when you feel like the ideas well has dried up
Whenever I do a school workshop, a child almost always asks me where I get my ideas from. I understand why – there’s a strange alchemy to what we do as writers, creating something out of nothing. Building castles in the air.
It’s natural to want to search for that spark – almost as impossible to comprehend as the spark of life itself. Where does it come from? What was there before it? How can it suddenly just exist? Of course it’s fascinating. It’s fascinating even to writers who’ve been doing it their whole careers, so no wonder it’s a subject of curiosity for children.
But despite having been asked it so many times, I’m still stumped every time I have to answer it. Because the answer is, I don’t really know.
The Edge of Solitude started life as a series of questions, along with emotional responses to landscape, during my visit to Antarctica in 2020.
For My Name is Monster, the idea grew slowly, over several years, out of multiple thoughts and scenes and influences. I can trace various bits of it to specific experiences, or to my responses to certain books, for example.
As for my third novel (the manuscript is currently with my agent – fingers crossed she loves it!) I don’t remember the spark. Isn’t that weird? It’s my most personal novel so far, with many of the places and emotions (though not the characters or story) inspired by my own life. And yet I can’t remember the moment I decided to write it. It just sort of arrived.
Suffice to say, inspiration is a mysterious process.
In the words of Leonard Cohen, ‘If I knew where the good songs came from, I’d go there more often.’
So what happens when the ideas stream runs dry? If it’s all such a mystery, how do you even begin to start coming up with ideas?
1 – Don’t be too harsh on yourself
I think the first thing is to be kind to yourself. It might sound wishy-washy, but I think it’s worth saying. Have you ever tried to think of your favourite book while someone is asking you over and over again what your favourite book is? Chances are, the titles of all the books you’ve ever read just evaporated right out of your brain.
For me, it’s the same with ideas. I need to find that space to let the ideas come to me. If I’m constantly berating myself for not having anything to write about, then my whole brainspace is taken up with frustration, leaving no room for creativity.
I also think it’s important to remember that it’s totally normal to have a fallow period – especially if you’ve just come off the back of a big project, or if there are big upheavals happening in your life. Sometimes you might be able to go straight into something new, but often your brain will need some time. And that’s ok.
2 – Fill the well
I can’t remember who first told me about ‘filling the well’, but it’s an image that’s stuck with me ever since. The idea is that, in order to write (to ‘draw water’ from the well of creativity), that well has to be full. Which doesn’t happen all by itself. Or, to mix my metaphors, inspiration is hungry, and we need to feed it.
So find ways to nourish your imagination and creativity. Read books – both within and outwith your genre. Go to exhibitions, if you can get there. If not, look at artists’ works online. Watch documentaries. Browse libraries’ online collections. Read Wikipedia articles about increasingly niche topics. Visit local museums. Read information boards.
Keep a notebook with you at all times, to jot down anything that grabs your attention.
Most of this may never make it into anything you write – but that isn’t really the point. The point is that you never know where inspiration might come from, so it’s good to give inspiration as many opportunities as possible.
3 – Flick back through old notebooks
As well as looking to other people’s work, it can also be useful to look to your own.
You might find hidden gems. After all, past you made those notes for a reason. Maybe there’s a nugget of an idea that you never had a chance to follow up. Maybe an inspirational quote you copied down. Maybe just a turn of phrase you used which stands out to you now in a different way.
You might not find anything you want to write about (after all, past you didn’t expand on it for a reason, too). But at the very least, looking through old notebooks is a reminder that you are still a writer. You’ve written all these words you’re looking over; you’ll write more words again.
4 – Freewrite
Sometimes, it can be easy to fall out of the habit of writing. I often find this, particularly when I’m coming off the back of one project and trying to ease my way into another. If I’ve been in editing mode, it can be hard to get back into drafting mode. My brain is primed for something different, and can feel all at sea when confronted with the blank page again.
One way to get past this is to freewrite: writing without thinking too much about it, just keeping going with whatever comes into your head.
Another option can be morning pages (writing 1-3 pages every morning, as a way to kick-start the day – or every evening, if you’d prefer, with the day’s stuff already swirling round your brain).
Alternatively, I find that keeping a diary can sometimes help. (Actually, I’m terrible at keeping a diary longer than about three days. The only time I can ever seem to manage it is when I’m travelling.)
Whichever option(s) you go for, the point is that it’s low-stakes writing. There’s no pressure to write something ‘good’ or ‘publishable’, because that isn’t the point of any of these exercises. It’s just about writing something. About getting back into the habit of putting words on a page. Yes, something might arise from it. But if it doesn’t, that’s ok too.
5 – Re-define success
What do you want your writing life to look like? Is it about books published? Is it about number of words written? Or is it something less tangible than that?
So often in our society, we’re taught to measure success by physical output (e.g. earning money to buy designer shoes and drive an expensive car). We’re conditioned to think that way when it comes to writing, too: more words, more books, more ideas = more productive = more successful.
Lately, I’ve been trying to draw myself away from this capitalist idea of success. Don’t get me wrong, I’d still love to land a six-figure book deal and win all the literary prizes – I’m only human. But it’s important that those aren’t the only things that define my success as a writer.
Instead, I’ve been trying to define ‘success’ as creative freedom: the ability to explore, to play, to read and write and let ideas germinate from unlikely places.
Because even when I’m not working on a Project, or bashing out words to reach daily word counts, I’m still a writer. I’m still experiencing the world.
What do you do when ideas evade you? Do you have foolproof methods of finding inspiration? Or are you so overrun with ideas that the problem is choosing which one to tackle next?
Let me know in the comments!
Good stuff, Katie