THE ART OF RECEIVING IDEAS - Part 2

In the last post we learnt about the impact of our personality in receiving ideas for any creative pursuit. (I believe everything is creative in this world) In short, the kind of person you are at that particular time determines your thought process and that in return influences your ideas.

That is the reason why you as a writer get stuck with limited genres. Your life is recurring in your subconscious mind. Can you master the way you think? Yes, by being aware of your subconscious. But for that you have to change the routine. Same routine will always give you the same results.

You can understand a lot about yourself by the story you are writing currently. You can understand your state of mind and your present personality. You will be amazed with your subconscious habituation. When the subconscious becomes conscious to you, then the change is possible. You have to train your brain. If you find out that your current stories are dominated by your past, then you consciously make an effort to live in the present. Meditation, thought checks, mindfulness, deep breathing helps. Keep your past in an imaginary vault or an imaginary external hard drive only to be opened when you need some material from the past. Consciously make an effort to think new. Meet new people. Change your routine. New life brings in new ideas.

This will revoke your present state of mind. If you are sad because of your past, then you can alleviate yourself with a little effort. Forgive yourself, Forgive others, learn from the bad situation and move on. Don’t forget, just forgive. You should never erase, you only keep it in the vault. Appreciate the good in your life.

But what If you don’t want to change your state of mind or your personality. Well then there is a short cut. Lets assume you want to write comedy. Then you start watching comedy movies, series, standup shows, books, and be around funny people for around 15 days. Here you are training and habituating your brain to think in a particular way. The sleeping neuron in your brain wakes up because of the new interest. Your subconscious gets excited. Soon your thoughts will derive funny out of nothing. Its called perspective change. You are seeing things differently. You might read a dark article, but you will find humour in it. This works with any genre. If you want to write a thriller, then read and watch thrillers. You can even focus on sub genres. Let’s say psychological thrillers only.

Disclaimer - I am not encouraging you to copy what you are watching or reading. Even while scrolling on google you might find a story, which your brain will automatically switch to a comedy or a thriller idea depending on the way you were training it. Your brain tells your eyes to look for it. Like when you see a number or think of a number few times, you start seeing that number everywhere, because your brain feels that number is important for your survival.