My brain is on overload today. I’ve spent the day doing one of two things — fighting through the Christmas shopping crowds, or listening to the amazing speakers at Ross Goldberg’s Marketing Masters Seminar. The seminar’s been great and I’ve got so many ideas from the speakers for products to create, articles to write, seminars to plan, and general improvements to make to my business. So today I have no shortage of ideas of what to create. But there are days that I do need come up with something, and I don’t have a room full of people to bounce ideas off of. I used to let those days really get me down, and I’d just not write anything and go for days without a fresh piece of content. And if you’ve seen any of my old sites you’ll know just how infrequently they got updated.

There are a few tips you can use to help jump start your creativity when you need to find something to write about. For me brainstorming pretty much involves a yellow legal pad and my favorite pen. Some people use software and follow a mind-mapping process, but I’m much more of a scribbler. (If you could see the draft of this article, you’d know what I mean.)

These are some of the things I do to brainstorm when I’m in need of an idea:

1. Write everything down. Turn off yoru inner critic and write down every single idea that pops into your head. Don’t discount anything at this point, no matter how far-fetched it seems.

2. Along the same lines and #1, write quickly and don’t stop to think about what you’re writing. I don’t know about you but when I’m in creative mode, I tend to write a lot faster because my hands need to keep up with my brain. If you can use a voice recorder to get your ideas out, that’s even better because we can speak much more quickly than we can write or type.

3. Let your thoughts flow. Let them wander where they will and you’ll notice that your thoughts flow into one another. One idea may spawn several more related ideas and you’ll end up with something you may never even have seen coming.

4. Once you’ve gone as far as you can, and you think there can’t possibly be even one idea left in your brain, then write for five more minutes. You might be surprised at what you come up with whn you stretch yourself just that little bit further.

Using these tips has never failed to produce at least one idea for an article or report for me. I hope that you can get some use out of them as well.

Leave me a comment and let me know what you think or how you brainstorm. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

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