Thread: Do you believe in the idea that people build on channeling thoughts?

Sometimes, I don't know where my ideas come from. I log onto this site and see people struggling for ideas and I seem to have a million. Maybe that's why I write and sometimes I feel blessed that I have the will to put my thoughts into a written form. I take beatings on my ideas and they can be very dark but I seem to write horror with darkness around me. However, at the end of the story there is some sort of message. Sometimes, it's very dark as in The Tequila Diaries. Then sometimes it's very dark but has comfy wrappings of hope around the death as in A Breath Before Sunrise.

I'll never say I'm gifted. I'll say I'm a man who has a word processor and a very active imagination. I always write dark stories but they end up being right. No politics here. I don't understand where the ideas come from and I don't know why I write without a monetary reward. I just have to tell the story surrounding the characters and make it true.

The sad part in all this is, my grandmother, who always got books for me can't read any of my books now. She has dementia. So, I write to a cold and callous audience for one goal. That the reader is entertained. I strive for perfection unlike many independent writers.

The sad part is my work is twisted. Oh, look for a free shorty soon called The Womb. It's a very graphic gross out short about a one night stand.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_axN0SOS5lo

Originally Posted by John Brightman

So, I write to a cold and callous audience for one goal. That the reader is entertained. I strive for perfection unlike many independent writers.

This is very generous of you. I, however, write unpopular experimental prose just for the money -- don't care if people like it.

Ya, but did you ever feel like someone jumped in your mind when you were sleeping? A bit hippy here but. Bah, it's weird.

OH AND, JUST BECAUSE I SAID INDEPENDENT DOESN'T MEAN I DON'T WRITE FOR MONEY EITHER. DON'T EVER CONFUSE THAT!

I HOWEVER, DO CARE IF PEOPLE LIKE IT BECAUSE IT'S MY LEGACY.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtcZq7ic4sc

WRITING IS IMMORTALITY! AT LEAST MINE IS. I guess that's where we differ.

Stupid question here: Is there any real reason as to why you feel the need to post links to music videos in posts that have nothing do with music? Just wondering.

I write because I enjoy it, I write because I have to. If I make a living off it (which is what I hope) then great. If I don't, I don't but it won't stop me writing.

I don't know where my ideas come from most of the time, usually they stem from random thoughts of appear half formed and I flesh them out. I don't really care where they come from, I'm happy that they are there and that I can find a way to express them.

I have a frequent schedule, I write at least 3 short stories a week, not including side projects (which I havn't really worked on) but so far I havn't had any problems with it, six months or so down the line. I've almost written 100 short stories in that time and I don't have any sense or worry that will end. I know I may eventually run out of ideas but that hasn't happened yet and I'm not too concerned with it.
My main concern at this point is that I may begin to repeat myself. That and titles. I don't want to start repeating myself on titles!

I think I understand what you mean. Before I started writing my story, it was very different from what it is now. But in the writing of the story some of the major plot twists and themes have come out of nowhere, completely by accident. But these accidental things have since dominated the story and have done more to give it direction than I think I ever could with my original plan. I think that a lot of writers say that the book writes itself, and I am only now discovering that really mean that literally.

You describe yourself as a guy with a word processor and an imagination - which describes me as well (something very similar to those words has been near the top of my blog for months). I'm not and will never be a writer in the common sense, I literally write to structure and occupy what otherwise would become chaotic and might make me insane. For years I wrote into unpublished documents (digital and otherwise), amassing huge quantities of written work, most of which will never see the light of day.

Stories don't often pop into my head, but they tend to get hijacked in the middle by something I can't understand sometimes. I know that's what produces my best writing, so ideally it happens a lot, but it is unfortunately quite rare.

I know, or at least I have a good idea, concerning where that comes from. It's not channeling, it's not drugs, and it's not insanity. Perhaps it will make me seem old-fashioned for saying it, but I really don't mind. Those rare moments when my typing fingers move of their own volition and the plot twists faster than even I can keep track of it - that's divine inspiration. It is nothing that comes from myself, as without it I am incapable of such things.

Perhaps that's what happens to you when things just appear in your head - if so, you should pursue those ideas for all they're worth, without thinking too hard about where they came from.

WRITING IS IMMORTALITY! AT LEAST MINE IS. I guess that's where we differ.

May I gently suggest that this is a poorly structured way of looking at it? Starting out to write your own immortality doesn't work, and a masterpiece doesn't usually happen by intellectual fiat. But that's off-topic, so I will say no more about it, other than to say that I too differ from you here.

For me, ideas never come out of nowhere. There's always a causal link from something I've seen or heard, or some conversation I've had, or events that have happened to me. Once I'm actually writing my story, the words flow because I know my characters so well. Good characters write themselves, so it takes very little effort for me to write once I'm in the mood for it.

Originally Posted by John Brightman

Ya, but did you ever feel like someone jumped in your mind when you were sleeping? A bit hippy here but. Bah, it's weird.

OH AND, JUST BECAUSE I SAID INDEPENDENT DOESN'T MEAN I DON'T WRITE FOR MONEY EITHER. DON'T EVER CONFUSE THAT!

I HOWEVER, DO CARE IF PEOPLE LIKE IT BECAUSE IT'S MY LEGACY.
Pearl Jam - Immortality - YouTube

WRITING IS IMMORTALITY! AT LEAST MINE IS. I guess that's where we differ.

It's like you have a gremlin inside you or something. You'll go along normally, then suddenly the gremlin will jump out and yell a few lines before you get him back under control.

Very odd.

My experience is that the ideas for the stories already exist in some alternative dimension that holds all of the possibilities fully formed. For example the idea for the aeroplane has existed since the dawn of time, mankind was only ready for it around the time the Wright brothers started inventing.

Because of this I am very thankful for every idea that uses me to come to life.

Sorry to hear about your grandmother John.