Writing prompts | Journaling exercises
Freewriting Friday: Saving an Abandoned Draft, Imagining an Internetless World & Signs from the Beyond
Three prompts to respark your creativity
Once you start writing on a regular basis, you will find writing ideas all around you, but you need to be open and ready to welcome them.
To capture the incoming ideas I keep notebooks around the house and use a notes app on my phone so those inopportune moments, like when I’m brushing my teeth and taking a shower (keep a small notebook in your bathroom; you won’t regret it!). When I’m writing on my laptop, new ideas attempt to take over, taking me down a new rabbit hole I wasn’t planning on visiting that day.
You can view those tangents in my Medium account, under “Stories” where the uncounted drafts are stored. You know the ones, right?! Those drafts sitting and waiting for your return. Let’s return to them, or at least one of them today.
Instructions
Use this time to write something personal or write from the perspective of a character from a fictional story you are working on. Or write a poem.
Allow your mind to wander, not worrying about the final product.
- Allow yourself at least 15 minutes for a freewriting session.
- Write in a place with no distractions.
- Only allow yourself to write and use this exercise as a guide.
- Only use your phone for the timer and turn off notifications.
- Move from one prompt to the next or focus on one.
- Don’t stop writing for the time allowed.
- Don’t edit yourself
Today’s Music Selection
I haven’t listened to Kenny G in ages, back in my college years.
Thank you YouTube!
Freewrite in response to all the prompts or focus on one. Whichever calls out to you. Use these prompts as a springboard to your next article, flash fiction, or short story.
As a fiction writer, you can use any of these prompts from your character’s perspective to get to know them better, maybe a story will start to form through your freewriting.
First Prompt
Go through your drafts here on Medium, or wherever you have drafts of your work stored. Find one and start freewriting. Don’t worry about titles, just freewrite further on the idea you had started.
Set your timer for five minutes and write.
Second Prompt
How would your life be different if we didn’t have the internet? Think about how the different threads in your life would be altered with no internet. Some of us lived with no internet but think how your life would be different if it was never a part of your life.
Set your timer for five minutes and write.
Third Prompt
Have you seen signs from the universe or the afterlife, what were they? Signs that made you feel like you made the right, or wrong, decision? Signs from those who have passed before?
Set your timer for five minutes and write.
Revision
Let your words simmer after a freewriting session. Go back and decide if you want to turn your words into a story or article. Then start the revision process.
@2021 Ellie Jacobson
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You can submit your writing to any of the freewriting exercises found at Flint & Steel anytime. There are no deadlines.
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