Inspiration is Everywhere!
One of the things my clients often ask when we talk about blogging is where to get ideas. Everyone can think of a handful of topics that they might write about, but what do you do when you have gone through your initial list of topics? I like to answer that question with a quote from one of my VA colleagues, Andrea Kalli. Andrea says, “Inspiration is everywhere!” And it is true.
I challenge you to play a little game with yourself. I call this game “That Could Be a Blog Post!” Try to see how many things you encounter in a 24 hour day that can become inspiration for a blog post. Make it fun and feel free to make loose associations (i.e., how making the bed in the morning is like cleaning out your email in box — you know it is going to fill back up but you do it anyway to enjoy the sense of order you have when it is newly cleaned out, or in the case of the bed, freshly made.) See how many things you can find that can trigger a potential blog post.
I think you will find that Andrea is right — inspiration is everywhere! If you are like me you are often struck by inspiration when going about your day but then when it is time to write find it hard to summon the muse. Which leads me to the next step in making this fruitful — find a way to capture those ideas when the light bulb goes off so you can remember them when it is time to write.
There are many possibilities, both high and low tech. I suggest that you find a couple that work for you. The key is to not get stuck on fleshing out the ideas but to just capture enough of them to remember in the future. It may be just the title of a post or an analogy you want to expound on (like the bed and the email box). Here are a few tools to use to capture those strokes of genius.
- Keep a list in Word or Excel
- Record a “note to self” using the voice recorder on your smart phone
- Set up an email box — inspirations@yourdomain.com and email the ideas to it
- Call and leave yourself a voice mail
- Use a web-based system like JOTT or Evernote
- Keep a small notebook in your purse/pocket/briefcase just for blogging inspirations
- For those inspirations in the shower there is even a waterproof pad called AquaNotes!
Whatever your method of capturing ideas, just keep your eyes and your mind open and you’ll find that inspiration truly is everywhere!
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