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.

Every writer has her own style and approaches writing differently. Some write in an office while others write at the corner coffee shop. Some have time to write non-stop for hours each day, while others can squeeze in only an hour here and there. Some have a strict routine while others take up their pen on a whim.

No matter what your style, applying discipline to your writing habits can go a long way toward improving your writing. While some might say following a routine squelches creativity and prevents the writer from fully succumbing to the muse, the evidence says otherwise. The top writers in the world — best-selling authors and screenwriters alike — consistently mention the routines they adhere to in order to get their words down on paper.

Getting the words on paper is what makes the difference between just saying you're a writer and actually being a successful writer.

The key to adopting a disciplined approach to writing is to start small. Sure, everyone wants to turn out twenty perfect pages per day, but it isn't likely to happen that way at first. Setting your goal that high will only lead to disappointment. A little discipline goes a long way, and it's much more motivating to work up to producing more words each day as time progresses than it is to find you're unable to meet your initial goal.

Start by giving yourself a requirement of only one page per day. Resolve to write at least three days per week. Make it not just a goal but a requirement. Stephen King forced himself to maintain a strict daily page count, and look where he is today.

Why discipline yourself by adhering to daily page counts or word counts instead of simply giving yourself the requirement to write for a certain length of time per day? One hour per day? Two hours? Because you'd be amazed at how much time you can kill while staring at a blank page. Make it a goal to write for one hour per day and you'll find out just how quickly an hour can pass without a single keystroke, but make it your goal to write one page per day and you'll find you have the urge to put something down on paper to fill that page.

Once you've decided on your minimum word or page count, you'll just sit down and write, right? If only it were that simple.

Having the discipline to write one page per day is an accomplishment in itself, but what should you write about? For many of us, the motivation to sit down and write doesn't always strike at the same time the ideas hit home. How to merge the two is another challenge altogether.

If you find yourself staring at that blank page with no ideas within your grasp, try journaling or random-topic writing. The Writing Fix website offers a random topic generator, available for free at the click of a mouse. Try clicking your way to a new idea. If you write fantasy or science fiction, check out the Fantasybits topic list for writing prompts.

Invest in a pocket-sized notebook for jotting down your ideas whenever you're out and about. Whether you're on the subway or in the checkout line at the grocery store, use your notebook to capture those fleeting thoughts. Write about character traits you'd like to incorporate in your stories. Make notes about possible story titles as you think of them, regardless of whether or not you have stories to go with them. Refer back to your notebook during those times when you're unable to meet that one-page-per-day quota without a little added inspiration.

For those who need additional prompting, try enrolling in a creative writing course at your local college or university. Most community colleges offer courses for a very reasonable price. Having a weekly homework assignment hanging over your head may be just the push you need to put that pen to paper. If enrolling in a college course isn't a viable option for you, join a local writers' group or an online critique group where you can receive encouragement from other writers in the same situation.

Remember, start small and build upward from there. One page per day will soon grow into two, three, and maybe even ten pages per day, and before you know it you'll be holding a completed manuscript or screenplay in your hands.

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!