Ideas are Born

"Where do you get your ideas?" Every successful author has been asked this question at least once, or so it's been said. I can't speak to the truth of that 'cause I'm not a successful author. Yet. But I can understand why people ask the question. I can also understand why authors seem to find the question frustrating or annoying.

Ideas are not gotten. They are not found. They are not lying around like pretty flowers, just waiting for someone to come along and put them in a vase. Ideas are born. Like any child, they start as something incredibly tiny, a whisper of thought, a flash of an image, a "glimmer in the eye", as they say. For that whisper to become a song takes time, much time, much struggle, effort and pain.

But struggle isn't enough. As with everything else, not all ideas are equal. Some are frail and sickly things, without the strength to survive the rigours of birth, much less the challenges of growth and long life. Others begin robust and complex, fit to fill an entire world with story. And - again - as with everything else, some ideas will surprise you. Sometimes the faintest wisp of a thought will cling to life with unyielding tenacity, becoming in time a full-blown panorama of beauty. Other times a strong, promising idea will peter out, or run crashing and burning into a dark pit from which there is no escape.

Maybe that's why those of us with the gift (or curse, depending on how you look at it) of ideas get so many. I'm told there are people who don't come up with ideas easily, who don't get random flashes of thoughts and stories at all hours of day and night, who don't wake up trying desperately to remember the fully formed plot line that played out in a dream. I will have to take that on faith because I can't quite imagine what that's like, unless it's similar to attempting improv speeches in 4-H.

The point is, I have ideas coming out my ears. When I was in elementary school our teacher gave us an assignment to write a pretend newspaper article using a random photo to spark an idea. I picked a photo no one else wanted: an otter swimming on its back. My teacher tried to dissuade me, saying I'd never be able to come up with a story based on that photo. She wanted me to choose a photo of police cars, or fire trucks, or politicians breaking ground for a new building, or people playing sports, or literally any photo that showed something actually happening. Because how do you write a news story - even a pretend one - about a contented otter? Easily, as it turned out.

The moment I'd picked up the photo of the otter, I had an idea. Several ideas actually, though I don't remember now what the others were. Using the innocent and boring image of an otter swimming happily in crystal-clear water, I crafted a news article about a controversial (and imaginary) city development project having a devastating effect on the local otter population. My eleven-year-old self was very proud of the result. There were quotes from the mayor, from wildlife experts, the whole shebang. All fake of course, but that's not the point.

Having ideas has never been my problem, so when people ask authors, "How do you come up with your ideas," I just shake my head, because - if those authors are anything like me - ideas are everywhere. At the same time, I really get where the questioners are coming from. 'Cause ideas are everywhere but doing anything with them is one hard slog.

If I wrote a book for every idea I've ever had, I'd be the most prolific author in the country. Sadly, it's not even remotely that easy.

Sometimes it's all there, the whole story encapsulated in the initial idea; a seed, ready to sprout and grow into a complex and beautiful life, just waiting to be planted, for pen to be set to paper and the first words written, like the otter story of my youth. Those are the times when writing is glorious, when my fingers fly across the keyboard and every word has its place, every sentence its perfect structure. But there is always a wall, a precipice, a sheer cliff face smack in the way of my idea coming to fruition and my story to completion. That rock wall is where most of my ideas die, before they are even fully born.

Something I've learned is that a character is not an idea. A setting is not an idea. A scene is not an idea and neither is a mystery. That's how most of my ideas start: a character, or an event, or a strange, new world (to borrow a phrase). What I've learned - through many, many literary stillbirths - is that an idea needs multiple parts. It needs legs and hands, a head and a heart. For an idea to come to anything, it must grow and multiply itself, continually becoming more and more complex, until finally, with great effort, it can be born. And then the really hard work starts, because once an idea is born, it still needs to grow into a story.

A lot of people have successfully birthed ideas and raised them into fabulous stories. That should be encouraging, right? It is...and it isn't, because it's also daunting. How do I compete with Tolkien and Lewis, with King and Christie, with Sanderson and Zimmer Bradley? How do I come even close to that level of genius, that level of brilliance and word craft? Honestly? I haven't a clue. If I figure it out - when I figure it out - I'll let you know. For now, I at least have the first step: ideas aren't found, they are born.