Pocket musings

Creativity sometimes doesn’t come easily to me (read my previous Proofread essay on inspiration). Maybe all the straightforward, fact-y journalism has just gotten me out of practice, but I’m constantly fighting to get it back or generate some more.

So a few years ago, I picked up The Pocket Muse at the dangerous-to-wander-aimlessly Barnes and Noble. It was a big leap for me to buy it like that — I didn’t read any reviews online (gasp!), didn’t know the author or anything she had previously written. I didn't know whether it would be better than the many other books offering the same types of creative writing prompts and practice. But the author's bio picture was of her and her cat; I had seen that kind of picture before, of a person I actually know and admire and who kind of inspires me. So I flipped through a few pages and swiped my debit card through the machine and that was that. The book looked/looks really cute on my shelf. But I never used it.

Until last night, when, as I'm getting more into writing in different forums, I opened to the first prompt page. I read “What are you waiting for? If not now, when?” And I wasn’t sure whether I was supposed to write something about that, or if it was just an intro-type thing, and that’s when I realized I’m being way too uptight. Quit overanalyzing, Allison -- stop the inquisition!

All right, what the hell -- I’m going to try some of the prompts and observe the creative juices flowing. First up: “Write about someone who is pretending to be someone or something that he is not.”

I'll let you know how it goes. In the meantime, please help: How do you work your creativity muscles?