The Mysterious Inspiration Beast and How to Find It

By Katherine Dunn

I'm writing this, curled up on a sofa in the Lake District, roaring coal fire before me and snow-capped mountains outside the window. I have visited Wordsworth's home, Dove Cottage, scrambled up fells, and had a whole week entirely dedicated to writing.

Am I inspired? Nope. Of course not. This week I've decided to take up cooking, reread the entire Harry Potter series and spend hours faffing around with the settings on my laptop to get it to pick up the faint internet signal in the house. The big myth of writing is that inspiration is some magical fairy dust creative people are spattered with. We just wake up in the morning, stare moodily out of the window then sit down to write a game changing masterpiece. As any writer knows, it's more likely we'll stare into a cup of tea for a good our before sitting down to hit a game changing high score on bejewelled. Writing is hard. You have to sit and think up every single word that goes into a novel. Not just the interesting ones like effulgent and cornucopia, all the boring ifs and ands and buts. You have to sit there, all on your own and put them all in the right order. Its enough to make you give up and decide accounting is the way to go.

I spent years and years searching for the magic answer. Writing guides are full of advice telling you to fill your inner inspiration well and use tantric meditation to meet you characters on the astral plane and other snazzy things that help sell their books. The only way I've found to get inspiration flowing is, sadly, just sitting down and persisting, writing and writing until I some how stumble into something that seems less terrible than everything else I've written. I don't know whether I'm actually finding inspiration or just falling into some exhaustion fulled delusion, but either way, at the end of the day I have a pile of words to do something with.

But, this isn't just a miserable article telling you just to work hard. I have some website resources that are excellent in kicking you into writing!

1. Write or Die http://writeordie.com/

Straightforward free online programme in which you set yourself a target word count and time limit, and you're given a blank full screen that, if you pause, stop writing, or delete words, grows redder and redder until it assaults you with your choice of air raid sirens, alarm clocks and babies crying. With lots of settings to mess about with, it can be adjusted to all needs, but, ultimately, is a beautifully simple way to get you writing. As it says: it puts the "prod" in productivity.

2. Written? Kitten! http://writtenkitten.net/

Another simple online writing tool. Set your word goal and start writing. Every time you hit your goal, you get another picture of a kitten. The purest expression of the internet in one website.

3. Habit Forge http://www.habitforge.com/

If remembering to write is your problem, Habit Forge is a good solution. You can sign up for free with one habit you want to form (eg writing x number of words a day), and it'll send you two daily reminders, at the time of your choosing prompting you to 'fess up to whether or not you've done your daily writing stint, or whatever goal you've set yourself. You get exciting graphics showing you how many days in a row you've managed to achieve your goal, little pep talks, and general low level nagging that will hopefully get your writing.

I hope these are helpful, I use them all myself, but it's still a struggle. Committing to writing takes effort. But don't blame yourself if you lose enthusiasm for a while, or abandon a project altogether. You can always start again. The words you've written don't unwrite themselves. Just give yourself a break and try again.

If you have any other websites you like to use for writing, please let me know! I'll gather them all together into a resources post with all our tips and hints to get writing.