Writer’s block is for real. You kind of feel embarrassed how you are being defeated, literally by a blank page. It's crushing, annoying, exhausting and hilarious all at the same time. When you are so fresh out of ideas, that you sit and state at the page for an hour or more, it makes you re-evaluate life. But, you shouldn’t resort to eating bags and bags of chips and dip. You should instead, seek better mining skills. ‘Mining for ideas’ as the hip cool kids in New York high-rises call it, is when you do a deep-dive into your mind to figure out what issues and topics you should write about. Make it personal Whenever you care about something, it shows! There’s no doubt in the world, that when you are really passionate about something, you tend to write better. You care about the people involved, the subjects, the impact a topic has on you, which will always show in your writing style. So find a topic that either you have personally been involved in, or affected by and select that. You may also find that one or two articles aren’t enough. You may need to make a new series of articles to fully express your ideas. Go across borders Sometimes, the best journalists or writers have chosen to go where their counterparts will not. A topic that is outside of your country, maybe feminist issues in the Middle East, or corruption in Asia, maybe green energy in third-world countries, something or other that isn’t so ‘local’ to your audience would be better. Consider researching some ideas that are important to another country and culture and see if you can become passionate about their plight. Cover it again Never be afraid to revisit a topic. You should never feel as if you need to give your readers something new, each and every time they open your blog. It's going to make you burn out so much quicker when you try to be unique all the time. Explore it from a different angle or just update the reader of the issues you covered from last time. Obviously, try to make it interesting and not just a repeat of the same talking points. Keep reading We’ve talked about ‘keep writing’ when you are stuck, but we also recommend you keep reading. Whether it be fiction, non-fiction or even the newspaper. Keep your mind hunting for a good topic, learn about various topics that aren’t immediately interesting to you. You never know when a story that seems mundane is going to suck you in; and give you the inspiration to follow it further. Talk about it Talking about writer’s block is nothing to be ashamed about. It doesn’t mean you aren’t as talented or able to work using your own initiative. Far from it actually. It's a sign that you want to work through a speed bump that others simply ignore and end up producing sub-par work. Speak about it with other writers, or your boss and see if you don’t get given some good advice 0n how to combat it. It's hard to always produce your best work. Quality control as writers is up to us but we must not put the bar too high so we never reach it. As long as we are trying to mine for ideas and work through a block, we are doing ourselves justice.
Mining and Expanding Your Writing Ideas
Updated: Mar 22, 2022
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