Tell Your Story !

Think about moods. Think about starter sentences. Why? Because now we're going to start writing your first short story. I'll give you some starter sentences, moods, and objects to trigger your imagination. Good luck! :)

Starter sentences:

1. They all reach for their mobiles
2. She wakes and finds him gone
3. It was hot, but she wore a scarf
4. His face was a study in despair
5. "You did what?"

Moods:

1. Action
2. Comedy
3. Tension
   
4. Drama
5. Nostalgia

Objects:

1. Glasses
2. Box
3. Flower
4. Books
5. Key

Point of View

I assume now you have chosen your characters. Now you need to raise the matter of the story's point of view. The point of view acts like a narrative voice of the story.

Some of you might ask: Why should we bother? We're writing for ourselves.

I myself do not believe in such statement. You write because you want somebody to read your story. If not, why bother to write it down? You can keep them floating on your mind if you want to keep them as your own pleasure.

The so-called-point-of-view is believed to be divided into 3 main categories: first and third-person narratives.

Third person point of view:
It is a safe way to choose this point of view, because we believe that we are being told a story, and the writer is in control of the material. The writer will lead them safely until the story ends. To make this technique succeed, you need to know what you are going to write. You need to take a good care of it, to make it interesting, so that people will 'listen' to your story. Here is an example for a third person point of view:

Spencer Hastings should have been sleeping at six thirty on Monday morning. Instead, she was sitting in a therapist's blue-and-green waiting room, feeling a little like she was trapped inside an aquarium.
— Sara Shepard, Perfect

First person point of view:
I'm Rose. Rose Greta Patricia O'Neil. Rose. Not short from Rosemary, Rosa, or Rosanne. Just Rose. The name is an embarrassment. I'm not beautiful or delicate or sweet smelling. I'm not even pretty.
— Maureen McCarty, Rose By Any Other Name

There is no right or wrong when it comes to decide which point of view you'll pick. The aim is to achieve the effect you would like to achieve. Love your material first, thus it'll come alive without missing any single details.

In Their Shoes

One of the most integral part of a story is a character. Most people argue that story grows as the characters evolve, and so the other way round. There are many ways to shape characters, but there are not many ways to live them up as real as they could be. First of all, give your character a name, age, and gender.

Then, let's think about the circumstances of your characters. Who are they as human beings? Are they asking for help? Are they tempted by money, power? What are their hobbies, interests, passions, religious beliefs, sexual preferences? Don't forget to give them values and emotions, likes and dislikes, as well as their strength/weaknesses/flaws/fears. You may want to give your fictional characters qualities that you or your family possess. Remember that interesting characters are the key to tell a story on their own.

Put yourself in your characters' shoes. Care about your characters and what happens to them, even the unlikeable ones, and your readers will follow suit. To make them even more real, listen to and observe the people around you, and this will help you to create characters on the page that are as realistic as possible.

Spontaneous Prompt

Let's trigger you creativity!
Tell me what comes up to your mind when you hear these spontaneous prompts:

• Perfume
• A tower of strength
• Like mother, like daughter
• Toast of the town
• Childhood dreams
• Bearing a grudge
• Out of sight, out of mind
• Waiting at a finish line
• Tall, dark, and handsome
• All I want is a chance to...
• Wearily, he closed his eyes
• Pain
• Camaraderie

Here's what I pick: 'All I want is a chance to...', enjoy! Looking forward to see yours :)

All I want is a chance to put everything in its right place so that everybody's happy. As I turn up my iPod's volume, I stare blankly and let Maybe Tomorrow from Stereophonics make me wonder. I so want to get back on track I am willing to risk everything for it. Is that too much to ask for?
My friend says everything is everything. The more you lust after it, the less you do have control of it. But who cares when everything in me means everything and nothing at the same time? It's full inside, yet it's empty inside. I've gone through a year of failure, thus I think I am through with redemption and resilience. I don't want to, I cannot move on when everything inside me is still trying hard to fit it.
I feel like a jigsaw in the puzzle, endeavor to find its spot on a bigger picture somewhere. All I want is a chance to put everything in its right place so that I know what I am. What is that you try to say?

In You, You Trust

Do you keep the list you made? The one where you have tried to recognize the variety voice within your inner-self? Yes, that one. Keep it close, keep it tight, because it will become handy from now onwards.

The reason why I emphasize heavily on that list is because I believe that techniques of writing can be taught, but talent is another thing. Talent cannot be taught, yet it can be discovered, nurtured, and developed. Writing a fiction involves more than the master of technique. Unlike using several Adobe products, there are a lot more than just technique here. A writer needs to know how to read, and how to think about reading and writing. At the end, it will help in making readers believe in things that you write.

Invest in your time, your emotions, your heart, and not to forget: your soul. Festivals, events, books, magazines, films... true, they can be a source of inspiration too. Albeit if much of the content of the fiction is borrowed from this source, without passing through the medium of the writer's heart and imagination, the fiction might fail to engage the reader and even might look unconvincing.

Find out who you are and what you know, and then more or less forget it. Fly with your imagination. The more you write, the more you explore, the more you will surprise yourself with who you are and what you can think. Come what may, and if imagination comes, rejoices. And keep writing.

"Remember, it is necessary for those creative minds living through the experience to revisit and re-examine the modes of expression and communication" (Theall 2005).

What Does It Mean to Mean?

Every designed and every made things was used to define a story. Definitions are there as an expression, to form patterns of communication. In a real way, it facilitates people the way to understand each other.

I chose What Does It Mean to Mean? as a title because I was trying to trigger your sense of feeling. Previously, I've talked about how to deal with creativity, and now I am trying to assess your creative side by trying to describe about feelings. Why? Because, before you start thinking or working on characters and storyline, you need to know what kind of atmosphere that will move your story emotionally. You need to make it alive so that people can sense it while reading it.

All of us contain multiple inner voices. All of us need a safe place to admit that we are angry, disappointed, ecstatic, and the list goes on and on. Use it as fuel for action, feel it when your emotions and perceptions battle and play out. Engage your feelings, view it with greater detachment, learn to observe.

Now, take a piece of paper and write them down. List your fear, your anger, the jetsam of your relationship, whatever. You can even list your hopes regarding the creative work you are about to do. Be free, be cruel, be silly, be self-centered, be exactly as you are in the moment. Do not stop to analyze it. Just write it fast, do not try too hard, and move one.

Why I encourage you to list those feelings? Because it is so familiar to you. By recognizing the variety voices within your inner self, you will discover many positive aspects that might have become silenced over the year. We know more but we do less.

This exercise, I hope, will help you to observe the feelings before putting them into words. To express feelings through definition, not to define feelings through definitions. And the most important thing is, to make you begin to feel again.