If you do keep one, what are you reading this article for? Go look at your idea journal. Second of all, the reason you are probably in this mess is that you don’t keep a journal where you jot down your ideas and inspirations when they come to you like so many writing gurus profess. They have slipped from the neocortex of your brain, but that does not mean they are lost forever. Ideas you’ve forgottenįirst of all, you probably have story ideas already. However, just because you feel like you don’t have any short story ideas to develop and write does not mean you can’t find them by using your own brain, pencil and paper, and the internet. Writing long term projects like novels definitely have their own challenges, but sometimes when the creativity boulder is already rolling down the hill, it is easy to keep it rolling. After all, you are writing and completely shorter projects all the time, meaning both you (1) use up more ideas and (2) have to start from scratch over and over again.

If you are a frequent short story writer this may happen to you more often than not. We’ve all been there - sat down before our computers, with time and readiness to write, and our heads are blank of ideas.

Short stories to write ideas