Using Pinterest as Writing Inspiration

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I have two Pinterest boards dedicated to my writing projects. The first is a compilation of pins giving advice on writing. The second is a collection of photos that could be, or remind me of, characters in my book. Here's what I use the two boards for (and how I keep from going overboard). 

1. Writing Tips (Fiction). 

This board has links to a bunch of awesome articles on writing. For instance, "Tolkien’s 10 Tips for Creating Epic Heroes" here. Or "How to Create a Vile Villain" here. Both articles I enjoyed.

I also have a bunch of witty writing quotes pinned here, which makes me feel a little more at home when I see there are other people in this world that can relate to my writing problems. (Or people who share said writing problems). 

At first I wanted to pin everything writing related, but you can see how that would quickly become overwhelming. So now I take the time to at least skim the articles that the pins link to, and if I like them I'll repin them. If they aren't useful, or it's something I've already read 100 times before, I'll skip over them. 

2. Story Inspiration

Is my second board, and this is more a collection of pictures. Some people say that your brain cannot create a face it has never seen before. Therefore, when we dream, the faces we see are actually not figments of our imagination but people we have actually seen before sometime in our life. It may be that we walked by that person in the store, or maybe she was once your Starbucks barista, but you have seen that face before. I don't know if this is true or not, but if it is that means we can't write about a face we have never seen and truly imagine it unless we are basing it off of someone we've met or seen before. 

Either way, this visualization board really helps me when my imagination is running low on gas. 

The other thing I like to do is find other pinners who have similar boards. If you search "Story Inspiration" and "Writing (Fiction)" on Pinterest, you'll come across a slew of people who are doing the same thing you are. I think I am following more people for writing and story inspiration than I am for any other reason on Pinterest (even food!). 

What are your thoughts? Do you think we can only dream/write about people we have seen before? Do you have a Pinterest board like mine? Do you think it would be useful? Leave a comment below :).