Brainstorming

The first step in any writing project is brainstorming ideas. You need an idea to write about. Brainstorming provides the sparks that generate ideas. There are four rules to follow for brainstorming ideas. The first is kick judgment out of the room. Go for quantity not quality. Do not criticize the ideas. Combine similar ideas and improve on them. Keep those rules in mind as you begin your brainstorming sessions.

Choose a quiet comfortable place, free from distractions. Relax and think. Write a list of ideas. Use mind maps. Mind maps are ideas connected to other ideas with lines. They can help you develop ideas for writing. Take a topic and start writing down ideas related to the topic. Set a timer, to whatever numbers of minutes you want. Get the ideas down as quickly as you can, without worrying about how good they are. You just want as many written down as you can manage in the time you allotted yourself. When you are done, circle the likeliest topics. You may find you have more topics than you expected. This is good. This is what you want.

Pick a person you know or a character from a movie or TV show you like. Sit down and write a list of ideas on a particular topic and do so from that person or character’s point of view. What ideas do you think they would produce? This is a good way to get things out that you might not otherwise think about.
Another way to do the job is to surf the internet and see what comes up. Type in partial keywords into your favorite search engine. Check the results. If you don’t see anything interesting, try it again with another partial keyword. Something will turn up.

Take a topic and ask questions about it. Make a list of questions on the topic. The answers to those questions will be what you write about. Rank them in order of how much you like them or whether you can write about them.

Play music during your brainstorming session. Music can help you relax and open your mind to whatever comes to it. Get silly. Try to generate the most outrageous ideas you can. Sometimes the outrageous are the best ideas. These are just some of the brainstorming techniques.

After your brainstorming session, sit down and read your list of ideas. Rank them and then put them in the order of your ranking. Pick the one you want to write about and put the others aside. Put them into your blog schedule for later. That’s what I do when I use these techniques. Take the best from your brainstorming session. Somewhere in your brainstorming notes, you will find something to write about. That was your goal in doing the sessions after all.

About pebblepup

I am not one who is comfortable talking about myself but here goes. I enjoy writing, family history, and reading. I decided to do this blog because I wanted to try something new. I decided to make it a weekly blog because I wasn't sure that I could keep up with a daily one, and monthly seemed like I was writing a magazine. I think I did ok with my choices. You'll notice that there are not a lot of graphics on my site. That's because there are graphics plastered everywhere on the Internet and those sites sometimes take forever to load. This blog is a place where you can kick back, relax and be ready to be amused. At least I hope I willbamuse you. This blog is on a variety of subjects from my ficitional cat agency, the FFL, which is monthly, to instructional blogs to editorials, which are my opinions only. I admit that I don't know everything and could be wrong -- I frequently am. Now, stop reading about me and read what I have to say!