Inspiration, in Eight Minutes or Less

Never fear--no infomercial here. I wanted to share this video of one of my favorite writing activities with you.

In this video, the unflaggingly delightful Lynda Barry will steer you through a brief (but crazily effective) exercise. I’ve used a variation of this exercise with my writing students (and I always participate, too). The power of writing to help us to unpack our memories (whether sensory, emotional, or just the logistics of a scene) is astounding.

The activity also reinforces a lesson I constantly repeat to my students (and myself): what we notice matters, and what we all notice about even the most similar scene is strikingly varied.

Too often, we dismiss our own observations as insignificant. There is so much value to being attentive to the world around us, and attentive to our own reactions to this world.

To start: write a list of ten random words (you can write them on index cards or slips of paper, or just as a list on a sheet of paper). Don’t overthink this.

And now, over to Lynda Barry, Champion of Creativity and Goodness.




How was this activity for you? Anything interesting come up? Which tutorials, activities, or prompts are most helpful to you?