This article discusses techniques to overcome the fear of the blank page and the fear of not having more ideas to continue writing. It also explains the mechanisms of brainstorming and drawing mind maps. not have more ideas to continue In two previous articles we saw how to take inspiration from simple images or ideas (a banana, a table, a cloud) to start the flow of mind that leads to the writing of texts and which arise in the mind of the writer a whirlwind of ideas and thoughts that would make the story you will write.
In this article we analyze the next steps that make writing a text and the creation of a story.
We have the idea. We analyzed
.
We wrote something and we realized that this is a good idea.
What's next?
Well, as it is difficult to continue say.
Each of us follows a path and its very special is only valid for that work. For example, I wrote "Ariadne's Thread" in two weeks, taken from a creative rush that made me invent situations and characters continuously, without interruption. "The delicate sound of time" instead took a year's time, a lot of documentation (we will discuss in another article), traveling on places to acclimatize, many drafts and discarded many ideas.
So what will happen "after" having had the idea and have it settled in my mind is a phase that will prove to be different for ciasciun writer.
Taking the example of Paulo Coelho, you are facing an ocean boundless. Your boat is your idea, your paddles are made by your imagination. As you write lodge deeper and deeper into this ocean and encounter the islands. You might decide to stop or not to sail to the farthest to the east or the one closest to the south decide to go south in fact excluding the route to the East
So every choice you make is extremely important and binding.
Even the most simple and seemingly stupid (for example, whether the protagonist has a mustache or not) will force you to follow a certain direction (if you decide that your protagonist has a mustache, therefore, must be an adult, he will not follow the treatments such as chemotherapy and may not have a birthmark on her lip, because otherwise you would see).
This theorem:
each choice excludes the other, it is very important. Because what counts in a story that is both realistic, plausible, it must seem real. The reader will not be fooled!
you say: "And the science fiction novels?". Even in this case is to the principle that every choice you make will exclude the others. For example, if you decide to set your story in a future where the polar ice caps have melted, you can not send the hero in Antaritide him or keep a diary on paper, since it would be impossible to produce it.
The fear of continuing to have no ideas or to find them all useless and insipid that all the writers of the world have experienced is called "fear of the blank page." The classic and famous writer's block. It 's a fear strongly related to the activity of writing and you must not think of feeling "alone". Everyone sooner or later they are caught.
Well, now we will see what are the techniques that will help overcome this fear.
brainstorming and mind maps A hand to be able to untangle the maze of choices, we are given by the activity of
brainstorming. This write on a sheet and the appropriate links, anything you can think about that idea, although at first glance may seem far-fetched or stupid.
Innanizitutto take time for you that you are ten minutes or an hour does not matter, you will find a time when you are sure not to be influences. Sit in a quiet place that is neither cold nor hot, vestivevi in \u200b\u200ba comfortable, turn off phone, computer, connected to the Internet and television. Close your eyes for ten seconds and then reopen it.
Now you are focused in front of your blank sheet of paper and your pen.
Write the name or description of your idea in the center and place it in a box (I will call Prince pane). Now write all the words, objects, expressions, and situations that you can connect the idea seems to hinge (I will call second-level ideas). Prince then link them to the box with lines. Now go on, writing new situations, words or situations that are connected to the ideas and connect them level.
After an hour of work you have filled the paper with ideas of the tenth, eleventh and twentieth level the idea completely foreign prince, but not for this nonsense (all the rest come from the same matrix). As you can see the idea
prince will be able to extrapolate a myriad of secondary ideas that you can use to develop it, make sense and create the structure of the story you want to write.
Then you can make a choice and act in two ways.
- Begin to write in any ideas that came to mind and discarding it as they find them, based on the feeling that you will;
- Please review the scheme and eliminate existing mental ideas that seem inappropriate ;
I recommend the first method because the impressions perceived with the aid of the mental map is very different from those that will live as we write.
Here you can see the mental map that I have spread my story to write noir "Parisian night."
Now, to make it clear how this mental process, we will go together to create a mental map.
Take for example the idea that no one I proposed in the previous article.
write in the middle of the sheet the key idea that he gave away to all that:
library.
Now we start the connections.
- there is dust on the bookshelf.
Well, INSERTED these considerations are ideas for the second level.
continue.
- Luke runs his hand on the backs of books;
- E 'in a moment of sadness;
- The library is an anthology of Pablo Neruda;
And then
- Luke thinks that books are like memories;
- Pablo Neruda's book reminds him of an important story. The story of a love.
So far nothing new. Now we begin to fly the mind.
- Now Greta is in Argentina to work
- She has left before leaving because he could not stand the idea of \u200b\u200bdistance;
- While studying he worked as a saleswoman in a bookshop;
- Neruda's book was the spark of their meeting;
Lets try it again a passage:
- Luke has learned the poems in the original language to able to achieve,
- Luke decided to go to go and look;
- Greta has a boyfriend Argentinean
I could go on for hours but it is better to stop here.
With just ten minutes of work we managed to reach the fifth level of ideas and to create a pattern to guide us in writing.
NB. The plot is only a guide, a hypothesis is nothing fixed or established. Always let the writing and feelings to guide you in your choices. Now you try writing a mind map of your winning idea! What do you think of this article? download the article. Pdf to print and store Free!