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When I find myself struggling with what I want to write about, I turn to writing prompts.

Actually, I don’t – and that’s where the irony of today’s post comes into play. Because I have spent the entire afternoon trying to think of a topic that I’d like to cover and so far I have come up empty handed. Despite the fact that there is plenty of interesting material to use from the literary grapevine this week, none of it has struck the chord that makes me want to sit down and mine my thoughts for a response.

So, I turn to writing prompts. Because I feel that prompts are too often looked down upon by writers, including myself, when they can really be used as valuable tools.

I remember in my early years of school being given writing prompts for creative activities or projects. I used to love them. I was always trying to come up with the most exciting, the most outlandish idea, trying to navigate a complete redirection of what was usually a very boring attempt at rousing my interest. I was actually trying to out-creative all of my schoolmates, though I don’t think I ever succeeded (let’s just say no one ever gave me an award). I hope I at least entertained my teachers. “You find a box of puppies on the side of the road” – INSTANT DRAMA! THE PUPPIES ARE ALIENS!

Or something like that. I was a twisted child.

At some point, as I began to develop my own ideas, I changed my tune and considered writing prompts to be a waste of time. Why spend effort trying to make a generic premise interesting when I could instead be working on a short story with an entirely original concept? Writing prompts were for people who were just starting out, not for those of us who had already been writing for several years.

Well, here I am, a long time distant from my teen-aged self, and I’m starting to appreciate the value of writing prompts again.

I have yet to sit down and play with a prompt, but I imagine that I will be doing so very shortly. The novel that I started at the turn of the new year has not progressed past the first several pages. That’s ok, I keep telling myself. I’m taking my time. But if I want to keep the energy up, I will sooner or later want to write something. And as I have no other projects that I am currently interested in, the easiest solution is to grab a fresh page, grab a writing prompt that I find interesting, and just go wild.

What does this accomplish? To be honest, it probably won’t produce particularly good literature, unless I really surprise myself and tap into some unknown well of brilliance that was just waiting to be released. But I might come up with a neat turn of phrase that I can use somewhere else; I may discover a new character that I want to explore; at the very least I will be using writing to entertain myself, which would be excellent, positive reinforcement. If the idea of working on the novel intimidates me, the best way to move past that is to just write for fun.

And what better way to take the pressure off than to let your imagination be free with someone else’s concept?

If you find yourself wading through the weeds of writing, give yourself a break and try a little frivolity. You can find prompts easily online – here are a few to start with!