Resolved: New Stories In The New Year!

Let’s look at some writing resolutions outside the standard advice. How many can you check off the list this year?

• In your planner, write something clever every day that no one will read until after your death.  

• This year, write a short story in your opposite genre. Do you write romance? Try war stories featuring one gender. Write action? Write a court drama that drags on. Work with political thrillers, try horror. Or maybe that’s the same genre. I don’t know. 

• Many people find joy in writing alternative endings to their favorite stories. Write an alternative opening to a classic and change the entire meaning of the story.  

• Join a group that isn’t a writer’s club. Observe humans in their natural habitat where they want to be, where they can relax and be colossal nerds. 

• Share your work with people who despise reading and get their feedback. 

• Write fresh knock-knock jokes, limericks, and one-liners, then try them out on people you’ll never see again. 

• Run into the mountains with a notebook, wander off the trail, sit on a rock or log, and write an entire short story by hand, as God intended. 

• Handwrite a 5-page letter to someone. Yeah, five pages.  

• Research far too long, weeks perhaps, and write 10 fabulous words in calligraphy.  

• I’ve always wanted to try this, but I don’t have the nerve. Go downtown with some paper on a clipboard and ask random people to contribute a sentence to the story. The first line is: On Tuesday, the rain fell up. 

I pray you write all the right words for Him this year. Have fun writing, and Happy New Year! 

Not all views expressed are those of every member of ICW.