Where does inspiration come from?

It is one of the most common things I’ve been asked as a writer: Where does inspiration come from? Where do ideas come from? How did I get the idea for a specific line of dialogue, a pun, a character trait, or even a name?

The reality is that there is no one single thing or method to get ideas. Inspiration strikes whenever it wants and the secret is to capture those ideas and those moments, to make the most of inspiration and that when you NEED to write, you sit down and let the ink flow.

I’ve written about this before but rather than repost, I’d rather re-invite people with a new post to listen to new music, to read outside their comfort zone, to try new foods, new drinks, visit new places, see museums, read non-fiction, and basically ingest enough information to ensure that your brain is always flowing with ideas for X or Y thing. Some people read the same types of stories, watch the same type of movies, listen to only one genre of music, and thus LIMIT themselves. 

DO

NOT

LIMIT 

YOURSELF

Open yourself to the world. Make it so that inspiration has a ton of ways to attack you and take it all in. One VERY important thing is to have multiple capture tools or to make sure you remember a great idea when it strikes. And sometimes all you need is a strand of an idea to grab onto. With careful pulling you’ll be able to see that a small string can lead to a HUGE thread but it’s up to you to follow that thread down the rabbit hole. 

Life inspires. Experiences inspire. Good and bad. It's up to you to be open to live as much as possible and embrace this ride called life if you want to truly maximize your inspiration. Also, look at the classics in books, music, and film. There’s such a rich wealth of stories already out there and sometimes the path to somewhere new first traverses something familiar. 

For me, I love ideating and thinking about different projects to see what comes up. Sometimes it’s methodical, other times it’s spur of the moment type of ideas. With poetry I try to capture lightning in a bottle but sometimes I take verses and nurture them to their final form. 

What’s true is that no matter what, experience leads to inspiration. The inspiration for my 13^th book, Given to Fly, came to me after I rode the Soarin’ ride at Epcot Center for the first time. In that ride, everything clicked and I paid attention, and I wrote down what I knew would be the story. After watching Quills (with Geoffry Rush) I was struck with inspiration so I grabbed a pen, some napkins, and wrote a poem in one go… small edits when I transcribed and it became the first poem that ever won me any type of prize (it's in my bilingual collection Twenty Veinte, if you're curious). 

But you have to capture that lightning. Don’t trust that you’ll remember. Don’t wait. Don’t get distracted. Get inspired… and amazing things will happen. 

Peace, love, and maki rolls.