Thursday, January 26, 2012

The File of Dead Ideas

When do you know it's time to let go of an undeveloped idea?  How long do you hold on to that idea that no longer inspires your imagination?

How long do you hold on to the past rather than looking forward to the future?  When do you make that call, that an idea is no longer inspiring enough to pursue?

If you can't tell, I'm struggling with this very question.  Currently I have five book ideas sitting in my queue to develop and write.  I've been working on one of late, but as you may have read on Tuesday, I put the story into the dead idea file.  I got the idea a couple of years ago and it lingered, but it was time.

I have one idea in the queue, however, that has been around longer.  And it sits there still.  I was thinking about the idea the other morning and while it did intrigue me all those years ago (when I was a senior in college, I'm pretty sure), it doesn't any more.  At what point do I say, "I have too many ideas that intrigue me more and so I'm going to say goodbye to you"?

I have all these ideas but I'm not yet feeling inspired by any of them.  Perhaps it's because I'm fresh off a round of edits and I'm currently finishing off the world-building for one of them.

But how do you know when it's time to let go?

1 comment:

  1. I generally tend to leave all my ideas in a document until I get inspired to write them. I don't give up on any of them, I just leave them until I want to write them (and if that ends up to be never, then I don't write them. ;) )

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