Managing the Idea Factory

 

Back in December, I wrote the following in an Instagram post: 

Here’s something you need to know about creative people. We have notebooks all over the place filled with our ideas and scraps of projects. We drink a lot of caffeine. We have periodic bouts of insomnia because we can’t turn our brains off. We get discouraged when we can’t see immediate results from the creative process. We drive our loved ones crazy. But is who we are, and we can’t change that. Nor would we ever want to. 

There are times when my brain is flooded with ideas and I can’t keep track of them. And then there days when I feel I don’t have a creative bone in my body left. The problem is that I struggle with organizing my ideas and moving projects forward. For my day job as a magazine editor, I constantly have to search for ideas for monthly content. We have monthly themes for each magazine, so that helps. I keep things organized in a very basic spreadsheet in Excel, month by month, and fill in each department as I confirm ideas and assign articles. I use Excel to track my monthly income from magazines, articles and blog posts, along with a brief description of individual assignments. For my other personal writing projects, however, the structure is just not there. 

I have a notebook I’ve labeled as being for “True Crime,” and if you peek inside, you’ll see jumbled lists of names, dates, places, ideas for true crime blog posts, cases I want to research for my podcast, and ideas for social media posts and e-newsletters. I would be in big trouble if I lost that notebook because unless a script or blog post is already written, I don’t have a backup source of content ideas. 

While researching efficient ways to organize my ideas, I found my head spinning as one blogger described using a program called Evernote to capture her ideas, Google spreadsheets to organize them and then another program to manage the workflow of each idea. Maybe I’m just an undisciplined mess, but the whole process made me more confused than ever. 

I would love to come up with some other organized system for capturing and executing my ideas, but so far I haven’t come across one. I’ve spoken before about how I consider myself a “pantser” rather than a “plotter,” when it comes to writing, but lately this seems to be hindering the creative process more than I’d like. I don’t want to shut down the idea factory that seems to be churning in my brain as of late but if I don’t find a way to streamline the inspiration, I’m afraid I’ll lose it for good. 

How do you keep track of ideas for your writing projects and stay on track? I’m open to any and all suggestions!

 

Renee Roberson is an award-winning writer and freelance magazine editor who also hosts the true crime podcast, Missing in the Carolinas. Learn more at FinishedPages.com.

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7 comments executing creative ideas, organization for writers, Renee Roberson, the creative process, writing advice

Friday Speak Out!: A Published Poem or a Passing Fancy: Analyzing Your Own Approach to Writing.

by Carole Mertz

We can learn from our own creative process. By analyzing how my latest poem developed, I discovered something useful. Writing involves a kind of sacrifice, but usually offers rewards that outweigh the sacrifice. I identified three phases in my process.

One late-summer day, my husband and I visited a nearby nature reserve with the intentions of enjoying the outdoor beauty and getting some exercise. He was dedicated to walking the trails, but I decided to forego the walking. “You go on ahead, I want to sit here and view the scene.” (I regarded my need to stay connected with my writing as greater than my need for exercise.)

Within an open-air pavilion, I viewed the dell below me. I was thinking about how to create a “list” poem in response to a poetry prompt. Vaguely, I wanted to list flowers in my poem. This first phase of my poem’s life was the subliminal or preparatory phase.

I worried whether I was making the best use of my writing time. However, I let the environs speak to me. I studied the various colors of land and sky splayed before me. Seeing various blooms, I remembered how my mother created bouquets in large baskets to place on the stage at my piano recitals.

But that was from a time past. This was today, now. And I wanted to think of the flowers I was seeing then and there. They were mostly wildflowers. Though I didn’t know their Latin names, I knew their folksy names. I viewed them closely. This phase was a kind of zooming-in phase.

Evening fell and we returned home. The next afternoon I recalled the beauty of the previous day. Suddenly the florals began to speak—a poem was growing. I recorded my sentences and for the next three hours was lost in a conversation between Queen Anne and the Black-eyed Susans. The poem unfolded itself to me, partly in free verse, partly in rhyme. (This was the concrete phase, in which I took pen to paper.)

Looking back on the work that yielded my 40-line poem, I realized the verses probably would not have developed in the absence of any one of the three phases. The initial phase included generalized, not necessarily conscious, thinking. The second phase was perhaps the most important, because then I was open to my surroundings and letting what I sensed register with me, the way insects use their antennae to define what’s around them.

In your work as writers, you may want to think about these phases. Do you allow yourself germination time? This is the kind of time you need to reflect broadly on the intent of your writing. Do you immerse yourself in your topic, either physically, as I did at the park, or through your imagination or research? And finally, do you apply yourself to putting your words on paper? Without the final phase, your thoughts may be, or may become, only a passing fancy.

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Carole Mertz’s poem, “Tea Time,” as described above, appeared three weeks later in WestWard Quarterly. Other poems and short essays appeared at WOW’s The Muffin, With Painted Word, Page & Spine, Tiny Lights, The Write Place at the Write Time, Wilda Morris’ s Blogspot, and in Rockford Review. She won second place in a 2014 mystery contest at Toasted Cheese. Her review of Carol Smallwood’s poetry collection is forthcoming at World Literature Today.
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Would you like to participate in Friday "Speak Out!"? Email your short posts (under 500 words) about women and writing to: marcia[at]wow-womenonwriting[dot]com for consideration. We look forward to hearing from you!

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1 comment Carole Mertz, Friday Speak Out, poem writing, the creative process

Dear Manuscript: It's Not You, It's Me

Dear Manuscript,

It’s been almost three years since you first began pursuing me. You followed me everywhere I went and spoke to me through the music I listened to. You introduced me to a dynamic group of characters and begged me to tell their stories. You made me want to revisit the town where I grew up and view it through different eyes.

We spent a crazy, whirlwind month together with me in front of the computer while you dictated. Sometimes, we argued. Sometimes, you made me cry. You kept me up late because I just wanted to hear how the story ended. And even after I heard it, our relationship continued through days of editing, proofreading, and a few beta readers. I was so excited about what we had created together, that I submitted queries to a few agents, only to hear, “sorry, I’m going to have to pass on this one.”

And then I’m not quite sure what happened. I got too caught up in what genre our story would fit into, and then I got frustrated. I pulled away from you. I thought we needed to spend some time apart so I could focus on my paying projects, which you couldn't understand. And then another, very different and shorter tale monopolized all my attention and I tried to avoid you altogether.

But I know that wasn’t fair, and you didn’t let me forget you were in my life first. You reminded me we have unfinished business. You suggested to me that we rework the chapters yet again, and convinced me that by revising the book into a young adult story we might have a fighting chance. I agreed with you, but I still haven’t let myself completely commit to you once again.

The problem was never you, it was me. I lost confidence. I let the nagging little doubts about plot, character development and resolution bring me down. I moved on and tried to forget about you. I’m so sorry for that.

I recently worked on those first chapters once again, and something clicked. I think we’re on the right track now. Thank you for not giving up on me. I look forward to spending many more hours with you again, really soon.

Sincerely,
Renee

Renee Roberson is an award-winning freelance writer and editor who blogs at Renee’s Pages.

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8 comments novel revision, Renee Roberson, the creative process