Just this past month, I have started writing fiction again. The past few years, non-fiction has taken over all of my writing time. I haven’t so much as looked at my half-edited ideas for fiction in years. At one point, I even thought perhaps my fiction writing days were over.
All that changed recently when I loaned a copy of my only traditionally published book, “Diary of a Non-Conformist Vampire Victim” to a new coworker. Just the act of watching a reader take an interest in my work again sparked that bit of creativity and got me working on a new idea for another vampire romance.
That first idea uncorked many more, and I found myself pausing repeatedly in my progress to jot down new ideas. It made me realize that no matter how far apart my creative writings, I have a distinct cycle for these. I thought it might be interesting to share.
Phase 1: The Idea Phase
In this phase, I have approximately one million new ideas. What if a vampire was a paranormal pet groomer? What if a prophecy was openly defied by the person the prophecy was about? I have a flood of ideas, and not enough time to write any of them.
As a teen, I would flit between these ideas, start everything, finish nothing. Now, I’ve learned to create a folder on my computer to house all of these, write everything about each idea that comes quickly and easily, and ignore all but one until after this phase has ended.
Phase 2: The Drought
As quickly and easily as these ideas came, that’s how fast they leave. Suddenly, I can’t come up with a new idea to save my soul. This was a great frustration to me in the days where I was competing short stories, but now I rely on my idea folder for these moments.
Drought times are when I work on old ideas, polish rough drafts, and generally live off the ideas I produced in phase 1.
Do you have a similar creativity cycle? What do you do to manage it?1