Is My Idea Worth Pursuing?

At times, in the middle of washing dishes or driving, we’re struck by an idea or a scene. You hear characters arguing or shouting enthusiastically about their adventure. You see the action happening and you suddenly get an urge, a tingling in your heart, to run and put it all on paper.

We’ve all been there. We can’t help it. We have imaginations that allow us to spin stories after seeing a child lose a balloon or an elderly person attempting to cross a busy street. But how do you know when to pursue these ideas? How do you know the enthusiasm won’t fizzle away after weeks or maybe even months of working on a story?

In my eleven years of writing, I’ve gotten many ideas about stories. I’ve jotted most of them in a small green notebook I’ve carried around for years. These ideas are like tiny seeds and once in my notebook, some vanish from my mind while others fertilize, giving birth to characters whose voices begin as whispers but grow day to day. My suggestion is to keep a similar notebook and every time an idea strikes, jot it down. Keep the notebook handy and every time that same idea comes to you with a new voice, a new place, or maybe a possible ending, go to that notebook and add it. Many times, you’ll catch yourself adding details you didn’t realize lived inside you. Continue to do this and soon you’ll start to notice that some ideas go beyond one, two, or three pages of scribbled notes. Continue to scribble and add notes about that idea until the urge to turn it into a story is strong enough that you think about it often. Have you noticed how sometimes while reading a great book or watching an amazing series, the characters come to you in the middle of the day and you wonder how they’ll ever overcome their challenges? It happened to me with Game of Thrones, I thought and worried more about Arya Stark than I did about some family members. The same will happen with your own story. You’ll start having feelings for your characters and soon you’ll want to know what’s going to happen to them, how will they persevere. That’s the fire you’re looking for, the one that’s going to keep you writing ‘till the end.