Legion World Forums LEGION OUTPOST Bits o' Legionnaire Business Missing My Mojo

Maybe it's just the time of the year but, man, I have been feeling super-uncreative lately. I've got like three different Bits projects in flight that I've simply just not felt the pull lately to work on.

I enjoy all these things, of course, but am just totally lacking in inspiration for about two months now.


I know I'm not the only one who ever fell into a creative rut, so I put it to you, fellow LMBers: What are your tricks of the trade when you need inspiration?

Long walks? Reading? Tons and tons of booze?

How do you refind your mojo?

a break. (a real break can be hard). sometimes its enough to switch gears ... and then come back to it.

I like the quote that nothing seemed so bad after a long laugh or a long sleep.

sometimes writing crap is good too, done is better than perfect.

I am feeling really stuck myself, after passing a big milestone. but i'm working on another project for about a month and doing some traveling for work and fun ... i cant really afford a break time wise but ... its what is needed.


i think being creative is a special talent and sometimes we've got a well that needs to recharge ... and i think it recharges via life experience and new inputs .... and rest.

its ok not to be "on" all the time. being creative is hard work ...and a great thing about humans. its really special we can create at all.

in the short term, if i must complete something, pacing and going for a walk are my best tools. I think better when pacing ... the trick is to write down the stuff you are thinking!


Also, Peebs has been setting up some hints and clues to a certain up coming RP. in case you havent noticed!

collaboration is also a great tool.

I am procrastinating on packing at the moment haha. sometimes we can be productive in our procrastinating!

My trick that works a lot of the time, but not always is that I start making lists. And tabulating. Arranging things into data sets. Either with the Legion, LMB, whatever. If you're a whiz at excel (like me ;)) that can also be helpful.

It becomes fun to arrange timelines, supporting characters, villains, who did what during which era, etc. One of those leads to the rest. At first, its almost mindless as you arrange data and lists. But for some reason that process starts getting my juices flowing as I start getting more excited about what's next instead of what's already been done.

Winter blahs have shut down my muse as well. I've got a bunch of stuff I want to write, but I feel like they are 'done' in my head, and that writing them down is just busywork, at this point, which I can't seem to work up the energy to do.

I think just coming up with ideas for Heroes of Other Worlds and Alternate Legionnaires threads is about all I'm good for, until my muse wakes up and prompts me to do something of substance again.

Inspiration tends to strike in odd places. I read about a planet and it's properties, or some poisonous snake, or symbiotic plant/insect relationship, and it makes me want to build up a character with powers working along those themes. I probably get as many ideas surfing sites like Sciencedaily.com as I do looking up obscure characters on Cosmic Teams or whatever.

Actual characterization, plotlines and background details tend to write themselves, once I've fond a concept character I'm itching to write about.

Tons and tons of booze does tend to help unlock my creativity actually (though admittedly it's better for poetry where I don't need so much long-term coherency, lol)

The main challenge I find when writing my Legion stuff specifically is coming up with an adventure to act as a background to the real story I want to tell; I am generally way more character-driven than plot-driven, so sometimes I know exactly what my characters need to do but as I am not Brian Michael Bendis I think endless issues of characters standing around yammering at one another is not necessarily dynamic storytelling for a superhero serial and so I always try to work SOME kind of action in there (it doesn't have to be a fight necessarily, just something for the characters to do other than talk).

Sometimes it's easy and kind of writes itself (eg: the story arc with the Subs and the League of Super-Assassins pretty much entirely grew from the characters' actions/reactions to one another) .....other times it is more difficult (eg: I wanted to do a Mon-El/Shady spotlight but didn't really have any conflict for them to face so it stumped me for a while).

I found this list of sci-fi plot seeds a while ago and have found that it is awesome for kicking off some good brainstorming: 1001 Story Ideas

Also, sometimes I find stories can grow out of exploring things that have already been introduced in the Legion's universe, or wondering whatever happened to ______ from DC's past. Sometimes it's fun and inspiring just jumping on Wikipedia or comic blogs and researching obscure stuff to reference or use as a story setting..

Raz, I did a similar thing a few years ago where I was trying to come up with adventures and scenarios for stories. I spent a good deal of time researching Noir movies / books / etc, and then also westerns, sci-fi and other genres just to get a sense of the diverse types of stories that can be told. That is really good for getting the creative juices flowing, even if by the time you've come up with your story it is nothing at all like the idea that inspired it.

Usually, what works for me is just doing it, even if I feel my 'mojo' isn't going on. If I commit to working on it and typing out what I have in my head, things just start clicking for me as I get back into it. I've done this with several things I've written, and things turn out more satisfying for me than I would have thought possible!

Another thing is to reach out to someone you've collaborated with before. Talk about some story beats and get their input. Sometimes that person will mention something small that totally makes things suddenly 'pop' for you, and you're suddenly ready to go. Plus, now you feel that you're doing it for that person, and it gives you extra motivation to move forward. (I've done this numerous times, especially with Cobie who's been my most frequent sounding board for nearly a decade.)

Not everything works for everybody, but I don't think either of these methods are all that me-specific.

Some day, I've GOTTA see some of these spreadsheets!

Plus, I'm sure they work better than a 43 year-old memory....

I can show you my Legion or Spider-Man ones where I plot out my 100 issue run of the series.

Lardy's method has always worked for me as well, and usually with him too. Sometimes I'll have a story 80% plotted out but can't quite get myself committed to doing it and Lardy gives me a small kernel of an idea that is totally brillaint, prompting me to figure out the other 20% and leap both feet first into writing as the enthusiasm starts growing exponentially.

(See: Lolita being the one to assassinate Belisarius as one of the most recent ones).

I've never been great at being able to push through the writers' block - ideas are rarely a problem, and I tend to keep notes on my phone or a nearby notepad, but converting it into prose is. What I tend to do, if I want to do something and can't manage it, is to do something tangential, like a bio or a micro, and see if that helps.

Writers block is a hazard and strangely it makes me feel a bit better to hear that everyone else is in the same boat that I often find myself in. I'd like to think that through my job and close friends I'm in a very creative environment and somehow that in itself will buffer me but sometimes even that doesn't help.

Ex, have you tried not thinking about it and trying to put your energy into something that doesn't require any thinking?

That may sound counter-intuitive but I had real bad block while writing Tempus Fugitive, my original drafted storyline called for another chapter of the Dream Boy story before I got onto that part that would deal with the fallout from the 'Introducing Squad Quantum' storyline - various Amazers apparently dead or injured, Typhoon kidnapped by the Dark Man, Captain Marvel wanting to find out what was really happening with the Imskians in Brainy's lab etc but as I was finishing the 'introducing...' arc I realised I didn't want to be tied down to writing Dream Boy stories for another year so just cut to the end arc without really addressing any of those story lines. That threw me into a right spin as I had written out rough drafts for the whole story a couple of years ago and wanted to do justice to it. I wanted to finish the story I had in mind for Rol and the Xanthu team and didn't want to do it a disservice by not acknowledging what had gone before. As Set mentioned above, sometimes when you over think something there's no appeal to actually writing it and that was where I was at.

I read voraciously and enjoy every science or history or music programme I can find so can't claim to be unstimulated but these didn't really help. My subconscious it seemed had already written it out, it just needed the conscious me to be distracted enough to give it room to come through.I found doing mindless stuff - cleaning out cupboards,never my favourite thing to do, with a notepad handy suddenly helped release the block.

Funnily enough I'm working on a new storyline set on Weber's World and have drafted out the general plot, written the first ten or so posts out roughly and have come to a halt. My plot says time to focus on one of the character's back story but I find I'm drawn to cleaning out the cupboard under the sink - maybe my subconscious is trying to tell me something?

Something else else else that has really helped in the past has been getting feedback as it helps clarify what works and what needs improving and can prompt the story to include something I'd overlooked.

And wine.

Chablis preferably.

I just try to break things up into manageable chunks, and keep a general outline that guides me to make sure I don't lose my way. My main problem recently has been finding the energy to actually put my ideas into writing, what with how busy things have been at work.

It does help that all my writing is about stuff I'm passionate about - the LMB, the Legion, Blaze, travel...

Oh, and in support of alcohol...

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/health/2012/04/13/the-problems-alcohol-can-help-you-solve/

"Specifically, the study, published in the journal Consciousness and Cognition earlier this year, suggests that a certain amount of alcohol — enough to make you blow a 0.075 on a breathalyzer, to be exact — could nudge your mind just enough out of focus to be able to explore unorthodox solutions to a problem. Whether this nudge is helpful or detrimental depends on the problem at hand."

Perhaps alcohol would help most in the brainstorming stage, like raz noted above, and perhaps for some writing like Harbinger shared - but I wouldn't drink any if I had to edit or proofread something, for example.

I make lists and spreadsheets.
It doesn't even have to be related to the project I am working on.

If it is purely an artistic block, I'll spend time browsing artists I enjoy and often just making copies of thier work.