10 Minute Writing Exercises To Kickstart Your Writing

We all need a little writing boost from time to time, and it’s important for writers to keep exercising their creative brains and practising and improving their craft.

Writing exercises don’t have to be taxing, time-consuming or laborious, in fact, these 10-minute writing exercises are simple to do, very effective, and dare I say it, even quite fun!

Finding 10 minutes in your day to kickstart your writing will help you feel as though you are always improving, that you are progressing with your work, and make it so much easier when you do sit down for a longer writing session.

So if you are looking for some quick and easy writing exercises to give you a bit of a boost, give these a go!

Random lists

Let your mind go completely empty. Then give yourself 1 minute to write a list of random words. They can be absolutely ANYTHING. Once you’ve finished take a look at them. Pick out 5 or 6 and use them as the basis to form a story. Alternatively let someone else do the hard work for you. Websites such as randomlists.com will produce lists of random words for you!

Word association

Start off by writing down one word. Again don’t think too much about it. Then use word association to write more and more. Once you are finished you’ll gain an insight into how your brain works, and have some interesting links to things you might not have thought of before.

Story cubes

Story cubes are a helpful way to inspire any writer who is suffering from a bit of a creative drought. Roll the story cubes, look at the pictures and use them to create a story about anything you like!

Writing on the go

Often it’s hard to get inspiration when we’re stuck inside, so instead, why not head into the great outdoors and see if you can find it in the big wide world? Sit on a bus or a train and focus in on something that’s happening around you, perhaps a conversation you can hear, or something you can see out of the window. Make notes about it, expand on it, and see if you can create a story around it. Or sit in a park or cafe and focus on a particular person. What do they look like, what do they sound like, what is interesting about them? Doing this will help you to practice picking out what you actually notice about someone, and what makes them stand out.  Use this when next describing a character and you’ll create a much richer and more vivid impression of them for your readers.

Character questions

An easy way to get to know your characters is to create a list of questions to ask them. Spend 10 minutes answering them on behalf of your character and by the end you’ll already feel you know them better, that they have more depth, are more real - than when you come to write about them in the future you’ll find it a lot easier to know what they’ll say and do next.

Remember, the key to doing any of these writing exercises is to try not to censor yourself, just have fun with it and see where your imagination takes you. If what you’ve written is complete rubbish it doesn’t matter, in fact, it’s good to get that out of the way before the real writing begins. Sometimes, however, you just might find a true gem or two - your next book idea, your next lead character - you never know!

Have you tried these 10-minute exercises? How did you get on?

Bethany Cadman -author of 'Doctor Vanilla's Sunflowers'

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