Monday, March 22, 2010

~Inspiration

Inspiration - arousal of the mind to special unusual creativity. From the Latin "spiro", meaning "breathe".

I honestly think I'd forgotten what it felt like. That feeling when you have to write. When all the sudden you've met someone new in your mind. When the world seems like such a perfect place to base a novel. When you feel that special wheel in your mind start turning. When your usually ADD mind is immediately focused. When all the sudden, you feel inspired.

In my experience, there are two kinds of inspiration: the kind you can act on, and the kind that just drives you insane.

Sometimes when you feel the urge to write, you know what you want to work on. All the sudden you have a brilliant idea about how to get the girl out of the dungeon, help the boy finish his sword, or encourage the purple giraffe to try parasailing. Sometimes all you know is that you want to write something with this new character you've just "met" or that your story needs to include walking through a field of daisies.

But then, there's that maddening sort of inspiration where you don't know what to write. Your spirits are soaring, your fingers are itching to fly across the keyboard, you feel light and happy and excited and you just have to write...what?

I absolutely hate that feeling where you just might die if you can't write something, but you haven't the slightest idea where to start. It's even worse if you honestly try to put something down, but it just doesn't feel right. Doesn't it just make you want to shake your brain?

As soon as I have some advice on how to tackle that, I'll get back to you.

This morning, I experienced the first kind of inspiration. The good kind. I think it has a lot to do with the awesome weather we've been having.

I didn't spring (ha, pun) into action with an amazing new chapter to add to Mirror or anything, but I sat down at the computer and opened the document I wanted to work on. I wrote about twenty-five hundred words that I actually like. That really isn't all that much, but it's more than I've written in a long time. Actually, I have a confession to make:

Until the past couple of days, I haven't written a single word of fiction since December.

DECEMBER. As in LAST YEAR.

Can you believe that? I couldn't believe it myself at first, but when I did the math, that's what I came out with. I even double-checked (which is more than I can say for my algebra).

Anyway, today has been pretty good. Inspiration this morning, inspiration this evening, and it looks like I'm going to finish this week's school work ON TIME for a change.

Things fell into a black hole awfully fast last week, but it looks like things are starting to look up just as quickly.

Life is a highway? I don't think so, Rascal Flatts. More like a freaking roller coaster. A roller coaster paved with worries, fears, laughs, good ol' days, irritation, and occasional inspiration.

And a heckuvalotta school work.

Enjoy your weather, and I hope you get hit with inspiration this week--the good kind!

3 comments:

Odette Bautista Mikolai said...

Thank you Kendra for visiting and leaving a comment on my post. Yes, I too need an inspiration today and you just gave me that!!!
xoxoxo

illunse said...

When inspiration strikes, I say let it take you where it will. Try to capture the idea that got you excited. You might be able to catch its essence on paper, if you're lucky.

At worst, you might have scribblings that will later make you wonder what the heck you were thinking ;)

Achieve1dream said...

Yep, I'm familiar with both kinds. I'm glad you found the good kind. :) Unfortunately I'm feeling uninspired and have no idea what to write, so no writing has been getting done. Oh well. It will come back to me.