At one time or another, every writer searches her heart and mind for a great story idea and comes up short. The muse is silent. The motivation is gone. The driving force that compels her to write just isn't there.

At this point, the writer has two options. One: wallow in self-pity, bemoan the situation and dwell on the lack of creative flow in the hopes that some interesting tidbit of an idea might magically present itself. Or two: take action and find something to get those creative juices flowing again.

While it often seems like the best ideas just appear in the mind — usually popping in at the most inconvenient and untimely moments — those ideas don't manifest themselves out of nothing at all. They come from somewhere, from a place deep within, where all the input your senses have ever received meets in a tangled jungle of sights and sounds and smells, textures and thoughts and emotion. That somewhere, that jungle, is what you as a writer need to learn to tap into at will.

That's where the Idea Generator comes in.

Not a machine but a technique, or combination of techniques, designed to propel you into creative mode.

This entry will deal with the first of those techniques, a simple method that forces your mind to look beyond what your eyes see, to probe your inner jungle to find the deeper story in everything around you. After practicing this technique, you'll find it difficult to look at any object and not see the potential for story.

How it works:

Grab a notebook and a pen and sit in the center of a room. Any room, the bedroom, the living room, it doesn't even have to be your room. A public place will do just as well.

Look around. A writer's greatest asset is the power of observation, and object targeting is a terrific way to hone that ability to a fine point.

Instead of focusing on the room itself, concentrate on what's in the room. What objects do you see? You may see furniture, you may see pictures on the walls, you may see knick-knacks on the shelves. If you're in your own room, each of these items may have special meaning to you. You may know Great Aunt Helen gave you the ceramic dog that sits by the door or that the silver candlesticks on the mantle were a wedding gift and the painting on the wall was a terrific bargain at the local flea market for five dollars, but for now, forget everything you know.

Focus on the objects in the room as if you've never seen them before. Let yourself be drawn to one object in particular. It might be a feature of the room, such as a fireplace, or something as simple as a book or figurine. You may be attracted to it because of its color or shape or simply because it's unique.

Once you've decided on an object, write a brief description of it in your notebook. This should be your initial impression of the object. Remember to look at it as if you are seeing it for the first time.

As an example, I'll write about that ceramic dog. (No, I don't really own a ceramic dog, but for the sake of this exercise I'll pretend I do.)

"Ceramic dalmatian, glass eyes, approximately 12 inches high, somewhat tacky."

Now study the object more intently. If possible, pick it up. Turn it over in your hands. Set it in front of you and walk around it. If your object is a feature of the room, approach and study it from several vantage points.

Make notes about any features that strike you.

My notes:

"Dalmation is hollow, ceramic, has a small chip in the front right paw, a plastic stopper underneath which covers a circular hole cut into the base of the figurine. Glass eyes seem to follow you around the room. Kind of creepy."

Now sit back and imagine the life of your object. How did it come to exist? Where has it been? Who had contact with it prior to it coming into your possession? Who might want or own an object like this? What role can this object play in a story?

These questions alone can provide a wealth of story ideas. How many novels or films can you name that feature an object as the driving force of the story? The Lord of the Rings, The Red Violin, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and countless other stories have been made with an object as the central focus. Characters need something to strive for, a goal, and often that goal is to obtain a specific tangible object rather than a certain emotional state.

Back to the ceramic dalmatian:

I ask myself, what role can this object play in a story? How can I create a story from nothing but a ceramic dog?

Well, let's see…

For starters, my dalmatian needs a home. We'll put him in the home of a rather wealthy couple. (Hey, even the rich don't always have great taste.)

Now that he has a home, how do I make him the central focus of my story?

Maybe he's valuable, an antique, or an exotic import that once belonged to someone famous. In fact, he's so valuable he draws the attention of a thief. Or maybe the dog itself isn't valuable, but, being hollow, he contains something that is…

It might not be great but it's a start, and all stories have to start somewhere. The goal of this technique is to get those creative juices flowing.

Maybe the map to a buried treasure is hidden in the fireplace behind the third brick from the left (an action-adventure). Maybe one of those silver candlesticks was once used as a murder weapon (a mystery/thriller) and maybe it still possesses the spirit of the victim (a horror).

Everything has a story to tell, if you're willing to listen.

Clustering is a simple brainstorming method you can use in a variety of ways. Its biggest benefit is that it helps you push past your analytical mind and reach into your subconscious mind for ideas that resonate on a deeper level. A single clustering session can produce dozens of great ideas.

In The New Diary, where I first encountered the technique a few years ago, author Tristine Rainer presents clustering as a journaling method for personal transformation. In the How To Think Sideways course, we used clustering to explore ourselves via a process that generated a wealth of material to mine later for story ideas.

The potential applications for clustering are numerous, but today I'm going to describe how I've been using the technique to develop realistic characters with depth.

Clustering is similar to mind-mapping. You begin with a central theme or a single idea and write it in the middle of the page. Then you branch outward, adding related words or phrases as they pop into your mind, and drawing lines to connect any related items.

How to Use This Technique for Character Development

I'll explain the process first, and then I'll walk through an example with images to demonstrate how the character cluster evolves.

I've found clustering works best if I already have a general idea of my character's occupation or have at least one or two basic personality traits in mind before I begin the exercise.

I start by placing the character's name or initials in the center of the page, and then I add branches related to any personality traits I've already decided the character should have. I also add branches related to the character's occupation or important events from his/her past.

For each item I add to the cluster, I ask myself questions: Why does the character have this trait? What event prompted him/her to be this way? How did the character end up in this occupation? How did this event from the character's past affect him/her? How did it change him/her?

As you answer your own questions, you'll add new ideas to the cluster. What you'll quickly notice is how important events from the character's past give rise to personality traits. It works in reverse as well. You'll find yourself adding new personality traits and then creating a backstory to explain how the character acquired those traits.

Let's say you've decided your character is a workaholic. Ask yourself why she's a workaholic, and add the answers to your cluster.

- Is she a workaholic because she loves her job so much she wants to spend every waking moment involved in that field? (And if so, what aspect of the field most interests her? Why? How did she get involved in it?)

- Is she a workaholic because she has difficulty making friends and turns to her job to fill her spare time instead? (And if that's the case, why does she have difficulty making friends? What events in her past prompted this difficulty?)

- Is she a workaholic because she's trying to make a name for herself in her field? (And if so, why is success so important to her? Does she have to work harder than others for recognition? Why?)

If you don't already have a few personality traits in mind, start with the basics. Is your character shy, outgoing, stubborn, patient, impatient, happy, sad, intelligent, dull, witty, lonely, needy, nurturing, loyal, protective, jealous, confident?

Add a few traits to the cluster, and then ask yourself how and why the character acquired those traits. Be sure to ask yourself whether the character is aware that he possesses a particular trait. The answer to that question can have a big impact on your character's personality.

What are your character's biggest fears? Strengths? Weaknesses?

What are your character's hobbies? How did he become interested or involved in a particular hobby? Why does he enjoy it? What does it offer him?

Does your character have any unique or unusual skills? How did he acquire them? How do they affect his daily life and his behavior?

What do you know about your character's past? His childhood? His family? His culture? Add those details to your cluster, and then ask yourself how your character's past contributed to who he is today.

With each new detail you add to your cluster, consider how that information connects to the rest of the information. You'll begin to see how your character's personality and background are tightly interwoven.

You may end up with words or concepts that don't seem at all related to the central theme. Allow one word to lead to another and let your mind follow the path those words create, regardless of where that path takes you. It doesn't matter whether or not your logical mind thinks a particular word is relevant to the character. Write it down anyway. It might become relevant later.

Character Cluster Example

Here is an example of the beginnings of a character cluster. We'll start with a character's name in the center. I'll use "Jack Smith" for this example. We'll make our character a doctor. We don't need to know yet what kind of doctor Jack is. For now, we'll just keep things simple and explore our options. Something else in our cluster might lead to ideas about a specific field of medicine.

I'll add a couple of personality traits: Jack is a workaholic, likes challenges, and has trouble connecting with women. He's also lonely. We'll throw in a hobby — hiking/backpacking — and then we're ready to start asking some questions about Jack.

Here's what our cluster looks like so far*:

This is where things get interesting. Pick an item from the cluster and ask yourself questions about why that item is there.

Let's take "doctor" for starters. What motivated Jack to become a doctor? Maybe his mother died of a terminal illness when he was young and he decided someday he would find the cure for whatever killed her. Now we have even more to work with, because that detail resonates with some of the other items in our cluster. Perhaps Jack has trouble connecting with women because he had no mother around during his childhood, or maybe it's because he's afraid of making a connection and then losing another woman he loves.

We can tie his loneliness to his trouble connecting with women, and to the fact that he is a workaholic and spends most of his time alone in a lab. Let's assume he hasn't found the cure yet and is still desperately searching for it even though his mother passed away long ago.

Let's add those items to our cluster and make the connections*:

Now we can take a look at some of the other items in our cluster. Jack's hobby is hiking/backpacking, and since we also know Jack likes challenges, let's assume he prefers to hike in exotic or even dangerous locales and enjoys tackling rough trails most people wouldn't dare attempt. He probably likes to push himself, to overachieve. We can use all those details to explore other aspects of Jack's life — aspects that could potentially generate story ideas.

Maybe during his trips to other countries he also spends time volunteering his medical services as part of a program like Doctors Without Borders. Perhaps he took up backpacking as a hobby because he heard a rumor about a rare plant curing the disease that killed his mother and the plant can only be found deep in the jungle. Or maybe he simply enjoys exploring the quiet woods on his own, a hobby prompted by his difficulty connecting with other people.

The important thing is to dig deep, to delve below the surface and discover what makes him tick. Keep asking yourself those questions. You'll discover new layers of your character's personality, and in the end you'll have a realistic, three-dimensional character instead of a cardboard cutout.

* The cluster maps shown in these images were created with a free mind-mapping software program called Cayra.

I've come to the conclusion I truly deserve to be crowned Queen of Procrastination. Procrastination is a big kingdom — especially with so many writers taking up residence there so often — so Queen of Procrastination is a title one would expect me to be proud of, yet somehow I don't feel quite as proud as I should. Instead, I'm burdened with the weight of the lurking feeling of guilt one gets after living in Procrastination far too long, which brings me to the topic of this entry: how to move away from Procrastination and into the much more rewarding place I like to call the Writing Zone.

The Writing Zone is a beautiful, magical place. It fills us with a vibrant excitement that gets our blood pumping and our skin tingling. It puts us on a high unlike any other. It's a powerfully addictive drug, only without all the messiness and legal problems.

Think back to the last time you wrote an incredible scene, a scene that just flowed from your mind and through your fingers onto the page. Think of how you felt as you poured out your soul through those words. Reach back to that blissfully perfect moment and try to call up those same feelings again. It makes one wistful just to think about it. Achievement of the Writing Zone is to a writer as achievement of enlightenment is to a Zen monk.

But how can one achieve the Writing Zone at will?

The question is a common one. How can a writer end a long period of procrastination — often given the notorius title Writers Block — and get back into the writing groove? We've all been there at one time or another, drifting aimlessly as we attempt to find the motivation to put words to paper. It's like a vacuum, a void where incentive and enthusiasm evaporate on contact, the writers' version of the Black Hole. It sucks us all into its murky depths at least once in our writing career — usually more than once, unless you're particularly fortunate — so it's important to be armed with the proper sense for recognizing that lost and aimless state and squashing it before it swallows you whole.

In order to address the procrastination problem, I've compiled a list of techniques that may help you overcome the desire to do laundry, wash dishes, rearrange the books on your bookshelf, alphabetize your CD collection, photocopy images of your hands, or do anything else that falls into the category of "excuses for why I don't have time to write today." These are simple exercises you can practice anytime, and they often can be useful even if you're not lingering in Procrastination.

1. Make a list of story titles. At this point in the exercise, it doesn't matter if you have a story to go with each title, just write down whatever catchy titles come to mind. Keep going until you have at least five or six titles, preferably more if you can manage it. To take this exercise a step further, try coming up with stories to go along with each title. To take it even further than that, try coming up with more than one story to go with each title.

2. Find a person — a friend, family member, coworker, or even a stranger you can observe for a few moments without looking suspiciously stalker-ish — and watch the person for a few minutes. Observe the person's physical appearance, posture, gestures and mannerisms. If possible, listen to him/her speaking and study the person's voice, language and inflection. Make notes while observing, or make mental notes and put them on paper later when you're no longer with the person. Based on your observations, turn the person into a character. Give her a made-up background, as brief as a few sentences or as long as a life story, whatever you're able to dream up. Once your new character has a history, put the character in a setting in which you feel she would be completely out of place (commonly referred to as a "fish out of water" situation) and contemplate how the character would react. You may find the basis for a new story through practicing this simple exercise.

3. Try your hand at an exercise called Freenoting. Freenoting is based on the practice of free association or word association, where one word leads to the thought of another word, which in turn leads to the thought of another word, etc., in a freely continuous stream of thought. In many cases, the words we associate in this type of free association exercise may be very unexpected. Here's how it works:

On a blank sheet of paper, write whatever word comes to mind, then write the next word that comes to mind, then the next, then the next, and so on. Don't stop long enough to think about what you're writing, simply keep writing non-stop. Stopping to think about what you're writing will defeat the purpose of allowing your mind to reach deeply and surface with new ideas and new thoughts. Try to keep going for at least two minutes. You can write the words on lined paper, adding each new word on the next line, or randomly cover a page with words, filling whatever blank space is available.

If at any point during a freenoting session you're hit with an idea or the inspiration to write, by all means stop freenoting and follow that inspiration. The purpose of freenoting is to trigger precisely that type of creative burst.

As an alternative form of this exercise, try practicing this same type of free association out loud, recording your words into a tape recorder or directly into your computer (if you're technically inclined).

4. Give random journaling a try. Rather than making daily journal entries to rehash the events of your day, write about a randomly generated topic. This forces you to think about something you most likely wouldn't have pondered on your own, at least not at that particular moment, and that type of thinking outside our comfort zone often stimulates new ideas. There are many good sites with random topic generators. The random topic generator at the Writing Fix site is worth checking out. For those who write fantasy and science fiction, it will take you months or even years to work through all the topics on the the Fantasybits random topic list.

5. Discipline yourself, but be gentle about it. Most successful writers describe adhering to a personal writing routine. As William Faulkner once said, "I write only when I'm inspired. Fortunately I'm inspired at 9 o'clock every morning."

Gradually train yourself to adhere to a routine of your own. To ease yourself into a routine, try sticking to a "one page or one hour per day" minimum at first. If you're the type who can sit in front of the computer and watch an hour slip by as you contemplate the wonders of screensavers, try going with the one-page-per-day routine instead of one-hour-per-day. Once you're able to adhere to a "one page or one hour per day" routine, make it one-and-a-half pages or one-and-a-half hours per day, and continue to gradually increase the page/time in half-page or half-hour intervals as you settle comfortably into the routine.

6. If nothing else succeeds in helping you overcome the pressing desire to procrastinate, try writing about procrastination. (Hey, don't laugh…it's working for me right now, isn't it?) Write about all the reasons why you don't feel like writing about something else. Write about why you feel like you're drifting aimlessly. Write about why you wish you were in the Writing Zone once again. Often simply writing about how or why you're not in the writing groove will put you in the writing groove.

In my last entry, I described my personal experience with writer's block. I had an abundance of story ideas but I froze every time I faced a blank page. I couldn't even start writing, let alone complete a chapter or a whole novel or screenplay.

There are two types of writer's block. Writers who experience the first type suffer from a lack of ideas. Writers dealing with the second type have no shortage of ideas but suffer from an inability to get into the flow of writing.

This technique is intended for writers bogged down by the second type of writer's block. It's a trick I learned a couple of years ago but at the time I thought it sounded a bit silly. It seems to work well for me now that I've given it a fair chance. Give it a try. It will help you get the words flowing again.

Step 1

Grab one of your favorite books, preferably in the same genre as the story you're trying to write. You'll only need the first two to six pages, so if you don't have a copy of the book handy, feel free to select an excerpt from the author's web site and print it for use with this exercise.

Step 2 (optional but recommended)

You'll need to be able to see the pages of the book while you type on your computer's keyboard or write in a notebook. For the sake of protecting the spine of the book from breaking, I recommend photocopying the first six pages of the book onto regular sheets of paper instead. Feel free to make double-sided copies to save paper.

Step 3

Position the pages next to your computer (or next to your notebook if you prefer to handwrite instead). Make sure the pages are placed in a location where you're able to easily read them while you type or write.

If you don't already have a document holder or a clip to hold the sheets of paper in your line of sight while you type, try a Page Up. They come in a variety of colors and designs, and you can get them for a few dollars from Amazon.com or from Cool Safety Products. (You can see all the colors and styles on the Cool Safety Products site.)

Step 4

Open a blank document in your word processing software, or open to a blank page in your notebook. Start transcribing the pages of the book. Type the text exactly as it appears on the page. Type each sentence, each paragraph, each bit of description and dialogue.

It might take only one or two pages of typing to get you into a writing groove. Sometimes you may have to transcribe five or six full pages before you find yourself writing freely again. I've found it rarely takes more than six pages to get me into the right state of mind.

Regardless of whether it takes you one page or ten pages, it won't take long to break through the wall that was holding you back. When you reach that point, set aside the book and start typing your own words instead.

For the past year, I've suffered from a form of writer's block that is completely new to me. Actually, any form of writer's block is new to me because I've never had writer's block before. I've always had more ideas than I'll ever have time to write about, and I've always been able to sit down in front of my computer and write without hesitation. Then, a year ago, something changed.

At the time, I didn't know what changed. I only knew I'd suddenly lost my writing groove. The ideas came at me fast and furious, as always, but when I sat down to write, the words just wouldn't come.

I put my hands on the keyboard and froze. My mind drew a blank. I couldn't string two sentences together to save my life.

This went on for days, then days became weeks and weeks became months. I went through bouts of depression. I felt frustrated, angry, stifled, and confused. Writing was my outlet, and now that outlet was gone. It had slipped from my grasp for reasons I couldn't even explain.

I hadn't lost my creativity. The ideas were still there, and more new ideas turned up every day. I hadn't lost my motivation. I sat down nearly every day with the intention to write.

I tried everything I could think of to get past the problem. I read books about writer's block. I tried journaling, freenoting, and every other technique I came across, but nothing worked. I joined online discussion forums and writing groups. The words still didn't come.

I've heard people say writer's block doesn't exist, that it's a myth. I used to think so too, until I experienced it myself.

A few things finally helped me escape the miserable, wordless void I was stuck in. Here are two of my favorites:

The first was a book called Writing From the Inside Out, which I wholeheartedly recommend. Dennis Palumbo's book is not a how-to primer filled with writing techniques. It's therapy for writers, and it works.

The second was Holly Lisle's How to Think Sideways course for writers. I'd already read and enjoyed a few of Holly's books geared toward writers, so I enrolled in her new online course in the hopes of reviving my writing brain. I went into the course with no expectations, just a promise to myself to make an honest effort.

After only three weeks, I'm already glad I enrolled, because in the very first lesson I learned how to get over myself. I realized I am my own worst enemy. I have trouble turning off my "editor mind", the internal perfectionist who thinks every word that hits the page must be magnificent and riveting. Because of this problem, I froze every time I faced a blank page. I couldn't write because, on some unconscious level, I was afraid my writing wouldn't be perfect. I've now discovered ways to temporarily turn off that part of my mind, to forget about perfection and write anyway, because once I start writing, the words begin to flow. That's only one of the many things I've learned since enrolling in the course.

A few days from now, I'll post the first in a series of articles about the other techniques that made a big dent in my writer's block and helped me to get writing again. Stay tuned and enjoy!