Say it With Me: No Idea is Stupid

Hey, do you want to read a story about giant worms that vomit a substance that enhances the mind and powers spaceships?

A lot of people would politely decline while backing away slowly, were they presented with an elevator pitch like that.

But Frank Herbert had a dream and he worked tirelessly till he made that dream, also known as the series Dune, a reality.  Just because your idea sounds a bit silly or ridiculous, that doesn’t mean it is.  It just means that your idea is in it’s rough, uncut form.  A diamond waiting to be polished.  Now that doesn’t mean that all ideas are good ones.  Some people have ideas that don’t go further than the outline phase.  But every time a writer thinks ‘wouldn’t it be cool if…’, they are exercising their brain and training the muscle known as imagination.

Do not be afraid to share that idea with others.  Identify two or three trusted friends and talk about your idea with them.  More often than not, their insights will prove invaluable to the development of your idea into a full-blown novel.

When I first thought of The Sword and Shield, I had no concept of the story-line or the characters that would be involved.  While looking at a cat scratch, I thought to myself, “Hey, wouldn’t it be funny if there was an assassin with an autoimmune disease?”  That’s literally it.  75,000 words later I had a novel being represented by a literary agent.

So don’t give up on your ideas and don’t give up on your dreams.  Just because they may seem silly at inception, that doesn’t mean there isn’t something magical wrapped up inside.

Bye for now!

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