8 Places to Find Inspiration

Whatever you are creating, the idea must spur from something…

Finals are coming, which means big papers, projects and random assignments that professors come up with out of nowhere. But what to do when the inspiration isn’t flowing? Good question. I have trouble with this myself, especially when it comes to creative writing pieces. If it’s an art project, some Latin dialogue or a presentation on your choice and you don’t know what to do, open your eyes (and carry a notebook around to write down your quick moments of inspiration. Unless you have a really good memory, or you have lots of ribbon to tie around your fingers).

Where to look/Where to go/What to do:

1. Wikipedia. Something that I enjoy about Wikipedia is that it points me in directions that may be quite irrelevant to the subject which I searched. There are tons of links that take you to other things, thus creating windows of inspiration and long interesting tangents. When you’re on a writer’s block or an artist’s block, search a simple idea or person into Wikipedia and let it guide you to more ideas for your assignment.

2. Sit outside for five minutes and use all five of your senses. One of my professors taught me something that opens up my awareness and my clarity of understanding. On the first day of class, he had all of the students go outside and find a place to sit down. Once we were there, we were told to use all five of our senses: feeling, smelling, tasting, hearing and seeing what was around us. After five minutes we came back into the classroom and shared our experiences. In five minutes I became so aware of what was around me, and it was inspiring.

3. When hanging out with friends, observe the things that you talk about. What issues are brought up? What ideas do you discuss? The smallest details or comments can spur the the largest ideas. And ideas can be portrayed through a piece of writing, a collage, a painting, a song, and the list goes on and on. If writing a story, grab traits of your friends to use for the characters of your stories, and create new personalities.

4. Draw inspiration from your personal life as well. From your favorite quotes, your bad habits, pet peeves, traditions that are in your family, your favorite food. Once you realize that inspiration is everywhere, it’s hard to narrow it down because you find out there are so many possibilities.

5. Listen to your favorite musical artists. Or even your least favorite artists. What do you like or not like about them? Why do you like or not like those certain aspects of the artists? If writing a piece of music, draw inspiration from the certain characteristics of the music you like while adding your own personal addition to it that is taken from the other sources of inspiration.

6. Look at your favorite visual artists. In the same way as listening to your favorite bands, if you are creating a piece of visual art then look at your favorite artists/least favorite artists and figure out what you like or do not like about their technique and style. And when it comes to content, find a theme that fits your personal style.

7. Read your favorite authors. Read poetry, excerpts of novels, essays, short stories, fiction and nonfiction. When they mention the character lucid dreaming on Sunday night, use lucid dreaming for your project, or dreams, or why in English, Sunday is capitalized whereas in French it is not. You get the point.

8. Check out the past projects of former students who had the same assignment. Read their stories, check out their art projects, look at the topics of their research papers. Copying clearly is not the way to go, but being inspired by another’s work never hurt anyone.