Finding Topics to Write About

Some nights, you’ve got a veritable fountain of topics to write about. You write about games, movies, friends, family, how much you love comic books, how much you hate comic books, places to eat out… the sky’s the limit. Those are good nights, when ideas flow freely as water and you’re able to harness each drop as you deftly craft each idea into a goblet of fine wine.

Then there are nights when you’re sitting in your office, becoming acutely aware of the pencil marks the house’s previous tenant left when he installed hideous shelves on the walls. You vaguely wonder why you haven’t taken the time to repaint the room when you took the shelves down. You aren’t writing, even though you know in your heart of hearts that you should be.

One of the cats wanders into the room, looking particularly ripe for a game of ‘catch the kitty.’ He bounds up onto the trunk serving as a makeshift, yet strangely effective coffee table and just stares at you. The next moment, the cat is gone and you’re lying on the ground, trying to pinpoint the exact moment that the chair tipped over. And also, what made you think it was a good idea to lunge at the cat? Seriously? Who does that? And yet…you still… aren’t… writing…

Tonight is one of the latter. So maybe instead of dwelling on the fact that you can’t seem to get anything written, you should step back from that hastily scrawled novel opening or that long-winded and tediously hashed out rant, and think about where you can find something to write about.

Some writers insist that you should write what you know. This tends to wander down the path of writing what you know well… which is just another way of saying “write about your expertise.” Well, maybe you don’t feel like writing about comic books, miniatures games, and turning a floundering small retail business around. Maybe you feel like writing something else. So do it. Write about something else.

Write about what you experience, rather than what you know. Did you watch/read the news this morning? Did any of the stories strike you as something you can relate to personally? Or did any of the stories come across as something so ridiculous that you can’t help but poke fun at them? So maybe you don’t know as much about Obama’s proposed health care bill as you could… guess what… no one does! It’s a 1000 page document! Doesn’t mean you can’t have an opinion on the media circuses known as the town hall meetings. Maybe you’re not 100% up-to-date on the presidential budget, but it doesn’t take genius to figure out that federal budgeting comes from tax dollars and you pay taxes (no one’s talking to you, Wesley Snipes) so you’re entirely entitled to an opinion on how Obama can justify spending $16,500 per night for a hotel room! Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert have been supporting their financial well-being for years just by poking fun at national and international news.

So what is it that we experience that can be an inspirational source for writing?

1) The News

TV, radio, newspaper, Internet… they’re all equally good sources for this one. Just spend twenty minutes perusing Yahoo! News or Google News and I guarantee you’ll find something that rubs you the wrong way (Brett Favre’s on-again-off-again retirement has been a good one for this)… or you’ll find that absolute gem of a story that’s screaming to be spoofed into something hilarious (anybody remember the guy who got drunk and crashed a motorized bar stool a few months ago?).

2) Friends/Family

I call this writing about what you experience rather than what you know because I’ve been living with a remarkable woman for a year and a half now, and I still don’t know what she’s thinking or doing 90% of the time.

Friends and family can be fantastic sources for inspiration, though. Surely someone you know must be in a different job than you with some wacky on-the-job stories to tell, or someone in the family has done something crazy enough to spark a whole article on familial traditions or foibles. These stories are begging to be told because we can all relate to them. Practically everybody has at least one friend or family member and not only is it fun to laugh at a few good stories, but it’s also comforting for a reader to know that someone else’s family is as crazy as his or hers.

3) Your Job

Pretty much the same as #2, but this time, the stories about the overbearing boss or the slack-y lackey are your own.

4) Pets

There are entire magazines dedicated to specific kinds of pets. And we’re not just talking about magazine racks raining cats and dogs here… we’re raining specific cats and dogs here! We have Basset Hound magazines, Terrier magazines, Beagle magazines, and so forth. Pet owners love to hear about what they can expect from their pets, or what diets keep the animals happier, or how to teach them new tricks.

So if you’ve developed a foolproof method for luring your cat into a bath (mine still involves oven mitts and a SWAT issue Kevlar body suit), thought up a new technique for Fido to play dead, or just have some amusing stories about the crazy things our pets like to do, then there is definitely a market out there for your work.

5) Your Personal Errands

Unless you’ve got a monkey butler, an overeager boy scout looking for another merit badge, or some kind of awesome servant robot, you’re going to eventually need to leave the house to run some of your errands (if you’ve got the monkey butler or the robot, call me immediately… I want to know where I can get one and/or both – you can keep the boy scout).

While you’re out and about, check out your surroundings. Is there construction going on where you live? Terrible or stellar service at the local grocery store? Did you stop off for lunch at a little independent restaurant you’ve never noticed before that you just couldn’t get enough of? People in your town want to know what’s going on where you live… don’t you think you’re qualified enough to tell them? And, if you aren’t, then who is?

There you go… 5 everyday sources of experience that will probably give you more to write about then everything you know put together.

Why are you still reading? Get out and write!