Writing Exercises For When You Don't Feel Like Writing

It’s a personal philosophy of mine that I firmly believe no writer, of any age or experience level, is too good for a writing exercise. While attending a writing workshop, I once had the chance to write some fifty-word fiction when a mentor encouraged us to blur the line between prose and poetry. It was divergent from the usual stuff I wrote, but one of the pieces ended up being good enough that it got published later down the line. That’s what writing exercises encourage you to do: to write freely and without tortured consideration of the next word. That's what this site dedicates itself towards- encouraging creation for creation's sake. In my view, writing exercises keep even seasoned writers on their toes. They can break writers out of dry spells and keep them grounded in the craft. Most importantly, they take the pressure off writing. A writer, after all, by textbook definition, is only a person who writes, and writing exercises are proof of that.

1. Write a flash fiction piece in 6 words. 

A classic example: Ernest Hemingway’s famed six-word heartbreaker. 

“For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” 

2. Free-write for five minutes. Put anything down on the page. Just make sure your pencil doesn’t stop. 

3. Write in a genre you usually don’t touch- whether it be poetry,  playwriting, or fiction. Then, once a storyline begins to emerge, translate that work into a different genre, i.e. fiction to screenplay, poetry to short story.

4. Write a dozen first lines. Some of the best lines in all of fiction are first lines. They need no introduction, they themselves ground the text early on with a sense of urgency. Some of my personal favorites are included down below:

“Call me Ishmael.” - Moby Dick, Herman Melville

“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.” - Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier

“I am an invisible man.” - Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” - Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy

5. Or, if you prefer, work non-linearly. Start by writing a dozen ending lines to work yourself backwards into a story.

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” - The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

“​​In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery.” - The Road, Cormac McCarthy

"please if you get a chanse put some flowrs on Algernons grave in the bak yard." - Flowers for Algernon, Daniel Keyes