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Well, in times past, to get my fingers moving over the keyboard, I’d resorted to something known as a kiriban for inspiration.
Over on my deviantART page, I have a contest. Be the person who captures the right page view on the counter, and you’re the winner. The prize is to be the star of a piece of original fiction I write. In the past, I’d generated a lot of interest and the hit counter would go nuts. People seemed excited and interested in being featured in an original piece of fiction, and it produced some pretty nice pieces from me. Things like The Lake, Remember Me, and Say Cheese were all kiriban prizes.
As a matter of gaining subject matter, I’d ask the winner to tell me about themselves, and their interests, hobbies, favorite foods, colors, bands, activities they participated in, etc. I got some pretty good feedback from most of them but had to pry stuff out of one or two. No biggie, I ended up being able to write something they all were (apparently) happy with. And I had a lot of fun in the process.
To get my hands moving again, I held another one this past week. I was dangerously close to the counter number anyway, but thought I’d give it a shot. And I have a winner. A nice person who’s a reasonable talent in her own right, even if I don’t care for the genre she writes (fan fiction, most of it for the cartoon “Avatar: The Last Airbender”). It happened pretty quickly, but didn’t generate NEAR the interest of my other contests. (A rousing round of “meh” is what it seemed to garner, frankly.)
Well, now that the contest is over and I’ve been in touch with the winner, I’m waiting for something to strike. Inspiration, an idea from the blue, that spark, that bolt that puts the elements all together to form something I can hammer into a decent story.
Nothin’. I got absolutely nothin’.
As I sit here and stare at what she provided, I realize I may have gone to this well of inspiration one too many times. And I owe her the prize.
I’m not in a panic yet. I know there’s a dampening of creativity due to the pressures of trying to find work and knowing my family is depending on me. Still, I felt certain something would pop loose and I’d find the way to create. I know I’ve gone stagnant on my editing process, and hoped this would jar something in that area too, but so far, this is a terrible dry spell. Like, Sahara Desert dry. And I’m … concerned.
What do you do to spark your creativity? I’ve tried reading favorite authors and I’ve tried just forcing words out, but neither of those has had any result so far. Any suggestions, wise gallery of friendly friends?
Sound off.
-JDT-
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