Meerkat Prompts: Not Forcing It
This prompt might feel a little…. meta? I don’t know if that’s the right term, but bear with me.
Sometimes, I’ll have an itch in my brain to produce a prompt post, yet cannot think of a specific prompt to write about. The more I urge my mind to conjure an idea, the more I feel like the hamster (meerkat?) in my head is running on his little wheel, going extremely fast but making no progress. The harder I think, the more strained the hamster gets, yet there’s little development of any tangible ideas.
I guess the idea is not to force the idea. It’s the same with writing stories as it is with blogging. Attempting it for the sake of it can be a frustrating experience. It’s better to let the creative juices build up rather than doing it dry (ahem!). To put it another way, you can’t force yourself to pee if you don’t need to go!
Now that you’re stuck with some grim metaphors, let’s try to see if we can in fact spin this thought into a larger post, but without forcing it. After all, forcing a post out when not feeling especially inspired or if you’re wound up is the ultimate exercise in consternation. The words flow more naturally and poetically when you want to write, as opposed to trying to do so for the sake of it.
Organic inspiration is the critical point. You might read a tweet, or a another blogger’s post, or perhaps even stumble across something out in the wild. Depending on where you are, you might need to remember what has inspired you for later, but with luck you may be in a position to put pen to paper right away. The post may certainly flow more easily in such circumstances, and it will therefore read like it flows easily.
To provide a further example of this whole idea, I’m now at a point where I’m not really sure how to continue this particular post, so I’m not going to. It’s time to cut it loose, lest I bog myself down in needless waffle. Remember people, don’t force it!
I remember learning this lesson years ago with books. As you may know, I am “blessed” with OCPD.🤣 When I read a book, I had to read the whole thing. No excuses. Once I started, I had to finish. I eventually learned it is okay to not finish a book. Some books suck. Sometimes, I need to put a book down and read it years later when my mind is ready to receive it. John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress comes to mind.
Most books aren’t worth reading one, let alone twice.
— Rousas Rushdoony
I definitely hear ya where both OCD and books are concerned! I have to make sure all the dining table matts face in a certain direction or it grinds my gears. I also like things like pens and TV remotes to sit at a certain angle relative to me.
Like you, I want to finish a book once I start it, and it will linger in the mind if I don’t, albeit there was one book that I was so dismayed by I couldn’t finish it. It was a sci-fi story about a former air force pilot who gets abducted by aliens, and recruited into their ‘air’ force. He immediately becomes the best pilot they have, beating out other, current air force pilots, all the women – human and alien alike – fawn over him, including one who more or less instantly falls in love with him, and everything is written through the tone of ‘this guy, who is an extension of me, is perfect, and oh, women are too emotional to do much other than look pretty’. I tried several times to finish it, but couldn’t stomach it.
“Once” not “one.”