FOOD: Instant Muse

Posted on May 7, 2008
Filed Under Food |

Stuck? Quick, grab something. Anything!
Seriously, anything with words on it. Take a pen, and underline every noun, verb, adjective and adverb you see. Transpose this word list to your notebook or computer. (A few days ago, I’d reached a bit of an impasse where it seemed like I was just recycling the same ideas over and over. I found the packaging from a pair of slant-tip tweezers my wife bough a few days ago, and got this word list: Tweeze, slant, grip, easy, point, simple, quick, make, work.)

Take these words and see if you can work them into your copy. Even if you can’t, the process of trying, of bringing in new concepts will jump start your brain, and you’ll end up finding something that works.

The Principle of Inertia
Here’s why this works; it’s simple physics, really. The Principle of Inertia states that an object in motion will stay in motion and an object at rest will stay at rest, until acted upon by an outside force. In this case, the object is your current project…and it will stay within the status quo unless something upsets the equilibrium.

The outside force is the word list that you found (that someone else wrote). Most of these words will have nothing to do with your project—and that’s a good thing. The brain looks for patterns to see how things fit together. When you introduce these new words, you brain will expand its frame of reference trying to figure out how all of this sorts out. New neurons start firing, and suddenly…magic!

The Creative Catalyst
The new words act as a catalyst to get your mind over the equilibrium. They provide just enough of a nudge to get all the ideas bouncing around again, until something sticks. And then your project is off and running at full speed again.

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