While I am supposed to work on other items, I cannot close the tab screaming, “Write your story!” What is this story? I do not know, and I think the mundane tasks of surviving each day have killed my curiosity. I wish to build myself a time machine that brings me back to the days when I would walk into work to find my muse and tell him, “Good morning.” Back then, I did not need information on how to find inspiration to write again for the feelings of each day unlocked books in my soul. I was always too afraid to tell him the truth meanwhile, he was always too afraid to let go of his past. There’s nothing more tragic than meeting someone who could have loved you but didn’t and that feeling was feul to my writing. Let’s look at how you can find inspiration to write after having lost your muse.
Three Things Required To Find Inspiration
Desperately, I reach for my keyboard and begin typing these words, hoping to get enough junk out of the way so stories can unfold once again. If you find yourself in a similar position, wondering how to find the sauce needed to power your writing, then you will need three important things. These are:
- Emotional Power: Find something that dramatically tugs at your emotions in a good or bad way. I don’t mean something that makes you tear up a little or smile softly; I mean something that makes you feel as if you were never alright in the first place or like you were always perfectly content. Studies find that emotions are a strong aspect when it comes to inspiring people so take matters into your own hands and build a collection of items that make you feel.
- Half Full Canvas: Nothing is more dreadful than looking at a blank page begging your mind to spill words it doesn’t have. Even if you have to use AI to get words appearing on a page, do it. There’s no shame in using a tool to help you get your engines started. After all, no one has ever submitted a first draft. Start with badly written text and build from there.
- Write For The Void: To find your mojo again and get the creative juices flowing, you will need to write a million badly written sentences. Don’t be afraid of writing poor content; in fact embrace it. Write the worst things that make you embarrassed to attach your byline. Get the junk out of your mind so that you can hone the skill of writing words that sing to the eyes and take readers on a journey of inspiration itself.
Build a system that brings you these three things, and you will not find yourself falling into a pit of no inspiration. This is hard for me because I happen to like dwelling in things and often forget it’s time to move on. I wrote an entire poetry book from those feelings of my past but I think it is time to find a new muse, something else that makes me write as easily as I breathe.
Practice Makes Perfect
Did you know every writer and author experiences periods of no inspiration in which they feel utterly hopeless? It’s human to have ebbs and flows in your creativity. After all, good writing is a skill just as much as it is an art. Malcolm Gladwell says in his book “Outliers” that the key to mastering any skill is to practice it for at least 10, 000 hours. This 10,000 10,000-hour rule suggests that before you find the keys to unlock your inspiration on demand you must struggle and write bad content for at least 4.8 years. That’s a long time and many many sentences that you must get out of your way.
I chose to do this on Medium where I write content based on a feeling. Every piece of writing I do on that platform starts from a particular feeling and I elaborate with whatever junk is floating around in my mind. I am told that is called a creative flow state. I happen to enjoy the feeling of complete immersion in my task, excited to see which words will appear next on my page. See this platform is dedicated to writing into the void for me for I have no particular target audience in mind. I am simply practicing the art of writing, of getting words out, of learning to be inspired. Find for yourself a similar place to practice your skill and don’t worry about its results.
Resources For Unlocking Inspiration
Lying on my couch in the mid-afternoon after lunch when I am meant to return to other tasks, I have created this list for you because I know that blank canvases are just as evil as the antagonist to your main character.
Music that made me feel something:
- Soul Meets Body, Death Cab For Cutie
- Youth, Daughter
- The Scientist, Coldplay
- Salt and The Sea, The Lumineers
- Numb, Linkin Park
Movies that made me feel something:
- The Illusionist
- All Studio Ghibli Movies
- A Walk To Remember
- My Girl
- Bridge To Terabithia
TV shows that made me feel something:
- The OC
- The Vampire diaries
- Lost
Books that made me feel something:
- The Kingkiller Chronicles, Patrick Ruthfuss
- Harry Potter Series, J.R. Rowlling
- The Lord Of The Rings Series, J. R. R. Tolkien
When all else fails, find a poet, and let them wreak havoc in your soul. I have a secret love for poetry because it is the once place where I have always found emotions blooming. It is a garden ready for you to go picking your bouquet of inspiration from.
Poetry books I drown in:
- Anything written by Rupi Kaur
- To make monsters out of girls, Amanda Lovelace
- Pretty boys are poisonous, Megan Fox
- My own writing
Conclusion
I hope that after reading this, you never need to know how to find inspiration again because you have figured out how to make a system for yourself that is designed to help you succeed. They say everyone has a book in them, and I hope this helped you on your journey. Remember you will need to feel emotions, so start from a half-full page and practice writing badly to get yourself going. Remember though that you are human and probably need a break from writing from time to time; not everyone needs to write the same way they need to breathe. I, on the other hand, will continue inhaling letters and exhaling sentences. If you haven’t already, subscribe to the email list so you never miss an update. Thanks lovely for reading this.