Capturing the Universe - Tips to Write
You can see it in your head. It's right there, crystal clear in bold, capitalized letters- but you can't seem to put it down. Even though your thoughts are co-ordinated and you have an accurate vision of what you want to write, you can't seem to find the right words.
This is what it feels like to describe a scenery- at least in my perspective. Sometimes, words just pour out of you, and you instantly get the most perfect paragraph ever. When that happens, don't stop. Continue writing until you exhaust your vocabulary bank.
I don't get a lot of moments like this, where I just feel like writing something especially good. I've got to get inspiration first.
Most of the time, I need a trigger, like a jump-start on a vehicle. It can be something small, like a faint thought, or something bigger, like a vacation or a distant memory. Whatever it is, though, it has to be associated with what I'm trying to write. If I can connect with it personally, it boosts the chances of me getting some quality work.
Every writer has their own method of inspiring themselves. It's up to you to find out what works best for you. When I write, I need to feel the emotion of the main theme, be it happy, sad, painful, playful, mad- if the character feels it, so do I.
For example, I was writing a scene that took place in the snow earlier today. To exhibit that on paper, I gathered every experience I had with snow. Then, I narrowed it down to the one(s) that best depicted the scene I was trying to capture. In this case, it was the time I was on a field trip on a particularly chilly day. It was an outdoor session as well- so by the end, I couldn't feel myself, couldn't think straight, and couldn't see anything but blurry blobs of color. Worse, I had drenched my legs in a river, which made everything worse. I took the emotion I felt on that day and amplified it as best as I could. (Side note: If you are in freezing weather, do NOT dunk your feet in a river. It is very painful and makes your feet go numb. My shoe fell off later that day and I didn't realize until we had traveled a few feet because my legs couldn't feel a thing.) Aside from that, I also encaptured a setting. I tried to put together every beautiful winter scenery I could think of, and placed my character there. Then, I run through the entire scene in my head, as though it were a movie.
When doing this, not only does the scene play out before my eyes, but I also hear a monologue in the back of my head. This monologue narrates the story as I would write it down. As I enact these scenes to myself, I tend to go in it completely, and sometimes begin making the same gestures as my character in real life. This is a good reason why I write in an isolated room, as it would be weird if someone walked in when I was swinging my arms like an axe, muttering things to myself.
The next step is writing it down, which is the hardest part. My preferred mode of writing is typing onto a document on a computer, so I always keep an offline thesaurus at ready. The internet is a handy tool as well- though just as dangerous. I always check my facts before writing something down to optimize realism. Even though I mostly prefer fantasy, I don't approve of nonsensical things happening at coincidental timings. I also want my scenes to be as real as I can make them. Maybe a character injures themselves. I would then look up real ways to treat that kind of wound on the internet. I use it for a bunch of other things as well- synonyms, adjectives, fact-checking and much more.
The internet can be a distracting place as well. I find myself getting distracted by the other tabs I keep open. I'm the kind of person who has a million of them running at once, and it drives everyone I know crazy, even me! But if you can figure out a way to prevent side-tracking, you are set to start writing.
Writing is all about creativity and experimenting, so don't feel demotivated if your first attempts at the scene fail. The example from earlier took me three drafts before I got it right. When stuck at points like this, try coming up with new ways to capture the same scene. Give yourself a refreshing break, and maybe read another piece of writing. Reading always gets my creative juices flowing. If I need motivation, I just read a few pages of a novel, and I'm instantly in a mood to write. Different genres put me in the mood for different styles of writing!
Similarly, everybody has their own inspiration points, each one triggering you to do a different thing. It's totally up to you to discover yours, as no one else can do that for you. Once your set on the track to writing- look out! There's no turning back.
Image Credits:https://pixabay.com/photos/writing-writer-notes-pen-notebook-923882/
This is what it feels like to describe a scenery- at least in my perspective. Sometimes, words just pour out of you, and you instantly get the most perfect paragraph ever. When that happens, don't stop. Continue writing until you exhaust your vocabulary bank.
I don't get a lot of moments like this, where I just feel like writing something especially good. I've got to get inspiration first.
Most of the time, I need a trigger, like a jump-start on a vehicle. It can be something small, like a faint thought, or something bigger, like a vacation or a distant memory. Whatever it is, though, it has to be associated with what I'm trying to write. If I can connect with it personally, it boosts the chances of me getting some quality work.
Every writer has their own method of inspiring themselves. It's up to you to find out what works best for you. When I write, I need to feel the emotion of the main theme, be it happy, sad, painful, playful, mad- if the character feels it, so do I.
For example, I was writing a scene that took place in the snow earlier today. To exhibit that on paper, I gathered every experience I had with snow. Then, I narrowed it down to the one(s) that best depicted the scene I was trying to capture. In this case, it was the time I was on a field trip on a particularly chilly day. It was an outdoor session as well- so by the end, I couldn't feel myself, couldn't think straight, and couldn't see anything but blurry blobs of color. Worse, I had drenched my legs in a river, which made everything worse. I took the emotion I felt on that day and amplified it as best as I could. (Side note: If you are in freezing weather, do NOT dunk your feet in a river. It is very painful and makes your feet go numb. My shoe fell off later that day and I didn't realize until we had traveled a few feet because my legs couldn't feel a thing.) Aside from that, I also encaptured a setting. I tried to put together every beautiful winter scenery I could think of, and placed my character there. Then, I run through the entire scene in my head, as though it were a movie.
When doing this, not only does the scene play out before my eyes, but I also hear a monologue in the back of my head. This monologue narrates the story as I would write it down. As I enact these scenes to myself, I tend to go in it completely, and sometimes begin making the same gestures as my character in real life. This is a good reason why I write in an isolated room, as it would be weird if someone walked in when I was swinging my arms like an axe, muttering things to myself.
The next step is writing it down, which is the hardest part. My preferred mode of writing is typing onto a document on a computer, so I always keep an offline thesaurus at ready. The internet is a handy tool as well- though just as dangerous. I always check my facts before writing something down to optimize realism. Even though I mostly prefer fantasy, I don't approve of nonsensical things happening at coincidental timings. I also want my scenes to be as real as I can make them. Maybe a character injures themselves. I would then look up real ways to treat that kind of wound on the internet. I use it for a bunch of other things as well- synonyms, adjectives, fact-checking and much more.
The internet can be a distracting place as well. I find myself getting distracted by the other tabs I keep open. I'm the kind of person who has a million of them running at once, and it drives everyone I know crazy, even me! But if you can figure out a way to prevent side-tracking, you are set to start writing.
Writing is all about creativity and experimenting, so don't feel demotivated if your first attempts at the scene fail. The example from earlier took me three drafts before I got it right. When stuck at points like this, try coming up with new ways to capture the same scene. Give yourself a refreshing break, and maybe read another piece of writing. Reading always gets my creative juices flowing. If I need motivation, I just read a few pages of a novel, and I'm instantly in a mood to write. Different genres put me in the mood for different styles of writing!
Similarly, everybody has their own inspiration points, each one triggering you to do a different thing. It's totally up to you to discover yours, as no one else can do that for you. Once your set on the track to writing- look out! There's no turning back.
Image Credits:https://pixabay.com/photos/writing-writer-notes-pen-notebook-923882/
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