{"id":2036,"date":"2011-02-05T03:00:04","date_gmt":"2011-02-05T09:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/writersfunzone.com\/blog\/?p=2036"},"modified":"2011-02-04T02:42:48","modified_gmt":"2011-02-04T08:42:48","slug":"spark-your-creativity-with-the-5-senses-listen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/writersfunzone.com\/blog\/2011\/02\/05\/spark-your-creativity-with-the-5-senses-listen\/","title":{"rendered":"Spark Your Creativity with the 5 Senses: Listen!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Dhoom<\/a>This is #2 in a series of articles on Creativity and Inspiration for Writers<\/strong>. Tips shared here are inspired by my ebook, Overcome Writer\u2019s Block<\/em><\/a>, and will soon also be part of a course at We Write Books community<\/a>.<\/p>\n

How can we be a better writers?<\/p>\n

We can step away from the words and dive into our primal sense of listening!<\/p>\n

What better way to change a mood? Find a mood? Reach a state of ecstasy? Calm down? Rev up?<\/p>\n

When I was 13 years old, I had to write a story for English class, a suspense story, no less! Mrs. Maffei was assigning us some cool and challenging writing assignments. And this one was no different. I had no idea what to write about, though I did know where to start: my local public library and my daily after school hang out.<\/p>\n

I’d already taken to flipping through the record collection (remember those?!) as a way to relax and take a break from homework. So I turned to them again for inspiration. I’d put on an album, classical, or rock, I don’t even remember, then just start writing whatever formed in my mind inspired by the music.<\/p>\n

After a few moments of writitng and listening, the first few times the image peetered out. So I’d just walk across the carpeted hall and riffle through the stack for another handful of records.<\/p>\n

Finally, I hit upon a song, I think it was some kind of dramatic classical, and a story spilled out of me and didn’t stop. A suspense story about a woman who gets murdered in her shower at midnight on New Year’s Eve during a party. And no one hears her scream.<\/p>\n

I know. Real orginal. I was 13. It was my first story. And it flew out of . Flew.<\/p>\n

I knew then and there that I was good at writing. And liked it. And would pursue it. Somehow some way.<\/p>\n

FAST FORWARD 30 years later. I still use music to put myself in the mood to write and edit. To get inspired and to just plain feel<\/em>.<\/p>\n