ScriptSuperhero.com

Asking yourself unorthodox questions can be a great window into the next fabulous story idea you latch onto. Here’s an example.

For a long time, brick, stone and mostly wood have been used as the standard building materials. Yet lately, I’ve been hearing more and more about the cost effectiveness of steel buildings. Businesses, homes, schools, churches, restaurants … suddenly, everyone is being encouraged to save money by building with steel.

Now, put yourself in a paranoid mindset, not unlike that of Adrian Monk on the USA comedy-mystery, MONK. Think a bit too much about why steel is being pushed onto the American public all of a sudden. Ask yourself silly questions about the possible motive.

Could enemy nations be working on weapons of mass destruction that are attracted to metal buildings, so they’re setting us all up for massive destruction? Now you have the idea behind a Tom Clancy-esque thriller.

Is a supervillain with metal control powers planning a similar slaughter of billions? Sounds like an X-Men versus Magneto plot to me.

There’s a lot of ways to go with even one simple idea like that. All you need to do is ask yourself a silly question.

Sometimes, a getaway can be inspirational.

We all get the doldrums from time-to-time, or the desire to just get out and soak up the warm weather while it’s here. Here’s a tip for successful writers: do it.

Not every day, certainly; and not too frequently. But do it.

But here’s how it can be productive time for you: don’t go anyplace familiar or ordinary. Do a little research and find someplace to go that you’ve never been before.

It doesn’t require a huge budget or even time off from your day job to pull this off, either. Wherever you live, there’s probably scads of places you’ve never taken the time to experience that someone five states away would love to visit and is planning a vacation around right now.

For example, I grew up in southern Minnesota. A more arid, flat, uninteresting piece of land would be hard to find, at first glance.

Yet here are some things that are available in that area, only some of which I took the time to visit while I lived there:

1) The Mystery Cave
2) The Spam Museum
3) Niagara Cave
4) Mower County Historical Society
5) Audubon Science Center
6) Storylady Doll and Toy Museum
7) Albert Lea Aquatic Center
Bayside Skiers
9) Griebrock’s Toy Tractor Farm
10) Pelican Breeze Cruise Boat

OK… suddenly I’m a bit homesick. You get the point? Even browsing an obscure antiques shop you’ve never walked into, or staying at a local bed and breakfast just to see your old hometown from an outsider’s perspective can serve as a creative spark that could inspire your next story.

Sometimes you have to do odd things to motivate yourself toward taking a professional approach to a writing career.

Some folks choose a day job that requires them to write, such as journalism. That’s a good one. Others prefer to get straight into the sort of creative writing they want to do, but without the “gotta do it” of a 9-5 job to motivate them, struggle to feel like an actual professional, especially in the early going, before the money’s flowing in.

Here’s an idea. Might seem a bit goofy at first, but it has motivated many: invest a bit in your self-image and your professional image by buying yourself a set of, say, 500 business cards.

And I don’t mean the cheap things you can do on your own inkjet printer at home. I’m talking about the ones you have to order at a print shop and pay a few bucks for.

As silly as it may seem, once you start carrying around professionally-made business cards that include your name, contact information and the job title of “writer” on them, it won’t take you long to start feeling a bit more professional, which will motivate you to work more on your writing.

And hey, drop some in those fishbowls at restaurants; it just might lead to some work - or at least a free lunch from some guy out to sell you insurance.

No matter what a person can say about ideas and perspective and prose style and character development, the main and most important key to success in writing is to write to completion in each project you take on.

That requires dedication, not sitting around fantasizing about Orlando vacation home getaways. Or, to put it more simply: sticking to it.

How many lawyers become successful by doing actual work only a couple hours a week? How many doctors become master surgeons by spending most of their time playing videogames?

None.

It’s the same with writing. You need to put the time in and treat it like a real job. Some folks marvel at how much a prolific author like Stephen King gets done. Yet his formula for success is actually quite simple.

He works eight-hour days, every day, with the exception of a couple holidays. That’s all it takes.

Well, that and a lot of talent. But talent cannot become evident while you’re spending most of your time sitting around thinking about writing. It emerges as you write more and more and more.

Write to completion and eventually the publication credits will come. Sit around thinking about it and you’ll never put words on paper, ever.