From Edie: Tim Suddeth shares how how writers find and develop story ideas through creativity, faith, observation, and intentional practice. Discover practical ways to grow ideas into compelling stories that connect with readers.
How Writers Find and Develop Story Ideas: Creativity, Faith, and the Writing Process
by Tim Suddeth @TimSuddeth
Gardening has been a part of my life ever since I grew up on a peach farm in rural South Carolina. (And no. Not all of SC is rural.) Everyone in my extended family and our neighbors had their gardens. Even my tobacco-spitting, 92-year-old grandfather.
Each year, Dad planted an acre-sized garden just after Mother’s Day. He would plow up the field and raise the rows. Then he dug a small hole, while I dropped the seeds, being careful to drop just the right number. After that came the waiting for them to come up. And hoping they’d outgrow the weeds.
Gardening is a great example of faith. You put the seed into the ground, then you wait while God does what he has done since creation in bringing our crops up. Even when our faith falters because of a lack of rain or whatever. But you trust this year’s crops to the same God who has been faithful in providing in the past.
It takes that same effort, patience, and faith to develop an idea into a story. Like a gardener planting seeds, writers begin with a simple seed or idea. It sits hidden in our brains, joining and growing with additional ideas until we have something we can develop on paper or screen. Because no matter how great an idea seems in my head, it’s only after I develop the idea that it becomes the fabulous story it was intended to be.
Actually, we don’t begin with just an idea. Our writing begins with our creativity. Our minds. When we develop a habit of writing, we are cultivating the soil our ideas can grow in. That is why, with time, I won’t say it becomes easier, but writing becomes stronger and more efficient. It becomes easier to come up with creative ideas to guide our readers through our stories. Because a story is the writer taking a reader on a walk through an idea. And the writer has to be careful to show the reader enough to experience the journey with them.
Just like we searched the rows in the garden each day for that first sign of a green leaf, we often worry about whether we’ll come up with a new idea. Whether it’s a spark for a devotion or the scene to a new story, it takes faith to let the idea sprout.
How to Get the Most Out of an Idea
1. Choose Wisely
Not all ideas arrive in our minds fully developed. As KM Weiland said, “One idea does not a story make.” Often, I get only the spark of an idea for an enchanting setting or an intriguing character. But unless something happens, or it leads to a life lesson, it’s not ready to be worked with. Yet.
To have a good, viable idea, it needs to be something you find compelling, that arouses your interest. (Unless you’re a journalist or working on a deadline, in which case it needs to be something your editor thinks is compelling.) If you hope to write something that will keep your readers’ interest, it should be able to hold your own. What image does it conjure up? What emotion does it make you feel?
Is the idea fertile enough that you can develop it with some research and revision? An unicorn feeding at your birdfeeder in your backyard is an intriguing idea, but it doesn’t help explain Isaiah 11. (How’s that for a writing prompt?) But driving through Virginia, and seeing so many Civil War battlefields, could be just what it takes to start a story.
The best ideas often come from a combination of curiosity, personal experience, and asking, “What if?”
Experience doesn’t mean the same as age. It’s like when you’re taking a long car ride. Are you looking out the window at the scenery, or are you doomscrolling and napping? Growing old doesn’t mean you’re experiencing life. To experience life, you need to notice what’s happening in the world, the culture, the people around you. It means appreciating this world our Creator has made.
2. Develop Carefully
I find that some of my most productive writing time, other people would call watching paint dry. Sometimes I’ll be working on a story or illustration, and my wife will elbow me and ask, “Are you okay?”
“Yep, just pondering.”
There are two places in writing where paint watching, er, brainstorming is important: when you’re developing the first idea and when you’re polishing the story—filing off the extra pieces and smoothing out the flow of the story. How will this idea react to that other idea? Does it clarify it, show it at a different angle, or take it down a rabbit hole that isn’t part of your story?
One of the most important questions I keep in my mind is, “Does this help my reader ‘live’ my story?” Because that is why I write, to share my thoughts and lessons with others either through objective writing or fiction.
3. Spread Widely
To get better at coming up with ideas, it takes concerted effort. Creativity is like a muscle. You have to exercise it (Stop groaning.) to make it stronger, more efficient.
A good way to start is by keeping a daily log of five to ten ideas. They can be on anything that applies to your writing. When you’re making the list, don’t limit the ideas, no matter how crazy they sound. You never know how a wild idea may lead you to a new and unique view you hadn’t considered before.
When you’re gathering ideas, it’s not always the quality of ideas that matters, but the quantity. By coming up with several new ideas, you learn which ideas work best for you. You also start finding that all types of ideas are around you; you just have to open your eyes, mind, and heart.
Good, workable ideas are valuable treasures. They need to be collected and carefully guarded. Safeguard them in a notebook or create a special idea file in your writing program.
It’s funny, I rarely go back and look at my old files. Just by collecting new ideas, I’ve trained my brain to be open to what it encounters. It amazes me how, once my fingers start hitting the keys, ideas come together like puzzle pieces. You just have to trust your creativity. And believe.
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