One of the perennial questions writers ask is, “Where do you get good ideas?” We all want to use the best ideas to make our writing better.

Our assumption is that we need to do something more or add a new technique, in order to find great ideas. Yet Stephen King wrote, “Let’s get one thing clear right now, shall we? There is no Idea Dump, no Story Central, no Island of the Buried Bestsellers; good story ideas seem to come quite literally from nowhere, sailing at you right out of the empty sky: two previously unrelated ideas come together and make something new under the sun. Your job isn’t to find these ideas but to recognize them when they show up.”

How do you put that into practice? It’s not a matter of doing something more, it’s actually a matter of doing something less.

It means less time on your phone, less commitments to things you don’t really want to do, less time watching mindless entertainment, and less time filling every possible nook and cranny of your life with noise and distraction.

Recognizing good ideas is not a matter of addition, but subtraction. When you free up space in your mind, it’s much easier to recognize and cultivate those great ideas that are so critical to writers.

Today’s Challenge: What is one thing you can stop doing today to free up a little space in your mind?