Choosing A Subject To Write On
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Before I move ahead with how to pitch your story to a newspaper or magazine, I think it's important to expand on how to choose a writing topic. This is a big writing roadblock for some people, but in all reality it can be one of the easiest and most enjoyable parts of the writing process. I know this is true because as I look out my window into the early spring of my backyard here in beautiful Wisconsin, I can easily rattle off five potential story topics without much effort.
- I see bare trees and I think of a story on important things to know when pruning your trees.
- Then I see my neighbor's travel trailer and I think of a story about five great travel destinations to consider this summer.
- The neighbors also have a basketball hoop in the driveway which leads me to a potential story about the growing importance of physical fitness with today's obese youth.
- My compost pile leads to a story about turning table scraps into a great garden.
- As I look at the clothes line I am reminded of energy conservation and how drying your laundry on the line is a great alternative to using the dryer.
There you go, five quick and easy story ideas on topics that would fit perfectly in your local newspaper or magazine.
Like I said in my last hub, when you're starting out try to stick with subjects that you know and enjoy. Writing about something that you are familiar with keeps the process fun and will help you focus more on your writing quality. And the better the quality of your work the better chance that you will be published in the future.
Another easy way to find story ideas is to look at what you do every day. If you're a stay-at-home mom, a story on "20 different fun and educational things to do with your toddler," would be a good subject. If you work in a field as broad as computers, try something specialized to your area of expertise. For instance, if you are a systems engineer writing code for a health care company, you could write about a common code issues related to health care. This will likely be a story you would pitch to a health care or technology based publication, but having such a specific niche subject will set you apart and increase you chances of catching an editor's attention.
You should also look at your interests when thinking of potential writing topics. If you enjoy numismatics (the study of currency), a story on the problems with counterfeiting in early colonial America might be a good option. Or even counterfeiting in current times, with emphasis on the ever-changing technology being used by the thieves and those trying to stop them.
If you're still having problems thinking of a topic, try taking a piece of paper and writing down in the center of the page a word or phrase related to something that you enjoy. Then circle it and start writing everything you can think of related to that one word. As you can see from my example below, it doesn't need to make sense to anyone else but you. What you are doing is putting words down that are associated in your mind and they are all related to something that you enjoy, and therefore would relate to and enjoy writing about.
So try this exercise or any of my ideas and please share any ideas that you might have below. If there is anything else I can do for you, please feel free to reach me at joe@starrwriter.com. Next time I promise that I will get to tips for developing a good story proposal. Thanks for reading. See you next time.
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Thanks Doghouse. I used to enjoy coming up with new, interesting story ideas during the editorial meetings at newspapers where I worked. Now I get to do it as a freelance writer. Devising great story ideas is almost as enjoyable as doing the interviews and writing.
I look forward to reading your Hubs.
Best,
Joe
We writers all have this problem. Writers block. We want to write, but what about? It is almost always is traced back to lack of inspiration. When we write, we have a subject we are passionate and are motivated to express through writing. Though without inspiration or motivation about a subject, what do we have left to write about? So we ask people, “What should I write about?” they might give you a slight idea, but people think differently from our selves. They might have a topic they are passionate about, but are we ourselves? No. So you search the internet. They give ideas, but not motivational topics. I know this myself because I often want to write, though have no idea about what to write about. The search doesn’t stop there for me. One thing I do is get my dictionary, open to a random page and point at a random word, and write about that. Though when I do that, my writing has no voice, no meaning or reason, other than I randomly choose this word. By this point, I feel hopeless. There are subjects out there, so what can I write about? There is one last thing I do. I write about, well, my surroundings. Say I’m writing with a pencil. I’ll write about the life of the pencil, or my question about. Perhaps I’ll talk about its importance to society, or compare it to other writing utensils, like the pen. Maybe I have a trash can around. Maybe I’ll talk about all the waste humans make, of how filthy it is. Perhaps I am writing on notebook paper, I’ll write about its importance, or how many trees have been cut down to make it. Or how we’ve gone from writing on stone slabs in Babylon to papyrus in Egypt to paper today. Random stuff, even at that. This system about writing about you surroundings gives motivation. A reason to write about it, even if the motivation is little. I once had a friend who wrote about a battle between a pencil and paper, how they refused to work together, and went into war, and another friend who wrote about a war in salad, how the blue cheese try to fight its way into the salad bowl. Not all of these ideas might seem appealing to adults, but they are quit free writes that are fun to write about. Heck, you could even write about your writers block.
In The Doghouse 4 years ago
Great suggestions to get rid of writers block. Thanks for all the information you have published in your HUBS.