Think outside your creative box.

Are you stuck? Are you sitting 2/3s through your story, and don't know where to go? Maybe it's because you're bored or maybe you've dug yourself into a hole you can't climb out of. Maybe your creative merry-go-round has stopped spinning and you don't have the energy to run around and around to get your story started again. What can you do to get your creativity back?

I read in a book recently ways to be more creative in your stories. Brainstormer activities. Let's say you finished a chapter or scene and you've sat back and thought, 'it's crap' or you've thought, 'What can I do now?'.

What can you do?

Try this brainstomer activity. Here's how it works:

1) Read the story below - it's sort of an impossible situation you've got your character into...how do you get them out? This is the point where your creative juices have run dry.
2) Fill in the blanks using the criteria beside it.

Story: Bad men have sabotaged your character's plane over an ocean. There's a bomb somewhere. If the plane crashes into the ocean, the frigid waters will kill her in four hours. What can you write next?

Fill in the blanks:
Automatic _________(this is probably what made you get stuck in the first place, you chose the automatic scenario...)
Obvious __________
Common Place __________
Interesting _____________
Unusual ____________
Odd ___________
Opposite _______________
Inventive __________
Creative ______________
Magical __________
Amusing ________________
Outrageous __________
Preposterous ________________

Here are my answers:

Automatic  - A writer should leave this one blank because automatic = boring.
Obvious  - She finds a raft on board and when the plane lands, saves herself.
Common Place  - She crashes into the ocean and a fishing boat saves her.
Interesting - She lands the plane, makes a raft out of luggage.
Unusual  - She creates her own bomb, and just before the plane explodes, she parachutes out.
Odd - Just in the nick of time, she 'flashes' and learns how to disarm a bomb and fly a plane. Oh wait, I've seen this somewhere...
Opposite - She dreaming, there's not really a plane or a bomb.
Inventive - She puts on all the clothing she can find, jumps in the ocean and stays warm long enough to get rescued.
Creative - She parachutes from the plane as it crashes into the ocean and somehow lands on an island where a soccer ball somehow just floats ashore. She and her new face-ball-friend survive on shellfish and coconuts and pretend they're on Survivor.
Magical - She jumps out of the plane. What!? She can fly!
Amusing - She jumps from the plane and lands on top of a hot air balloon.
Outrageous - She decides to commit suicide and crashes the plane. The end.
Preposterous - Just as the plane is about to land in the ocean, she get's beamed up to a space ship with a little green guy who tells her she has a better life in an alternate reality.

The key is, get your creative juices flowing and think outside the box.

Source: Brainstormer
Picture source: here