Writing Inspiration: Six Mini-Cards to Get You Thinking

by Ali | May 29, 2012 | Old post | 20 comments

Look what I made!

(Thanks to moo.com.)

These are mini-cards, half the size of regular business cards. I’ll be handing these out at BlogWorld New York next week, but if you can’t make it to BlogWorld, I hope you enjoy looking at them here. 🙂

I’d love to hear which one(s) you like best: pop a comment below to tell me. Or, if you have any of your own ideas along similar lines, feel free to share those too!

20 Comments

Silver Huang on May 29, 2012 at 4:29 pm

My favorites are the last two:
“You don’t find time to write. You make time.” and “To write faster: Plan first. Set a timer. Edit later.”

I found that my writing speed increased dramatically (even though it is still extremely slow as you know) when I decided to just spew stream-of-consciousness material out onto the screen without thought for even spelling, grammar or even complete phrases or sentences at times.

Basically the idea was to type as fast as I could think, with no care for word limit. Starting point is inspiration and then the writing was either to flesh it out or to discover if there was a point at all to make. Many times, there wasn’t… but until I brain dumped, I wouldn’t have known.

Strangely, even brain dumping therefore can sound like a waste of time, as not every dump results in a useable post, I feel that the act of just getting the thoughts out, however incomplete, as a discipline just helped.

Is it the same for you Ali?
Silver Huang’s last blog post ..Update! Exciting News And Something Special For June 2012
- Ali on May 29, 2012 at 9:54 pm
  
  Thanks, Silver!
  
  For me, writing is a thinking process… today, I wrote out 2,400 words for my BlogWorld session next week (despite the fact I won’t use those words — I’ll reduce them to notes, and then just use the slides I made). I’m a more disciplined thinker when I write instead of just gazing into space, though! Sounds like your process is similar?
  - Silver Huang on May 30, 2012 at 6:30 am
    
    Yeah that sounds about right.
    
    Julia Cameron was right, getting it out onto the page is the key. Keeping it in the head just keeps it in a near unusable ephemeral form.
    
    Can’t mold smoke into gold. LOL.
Carole Lyden on May 29, 2012 at 4:48 pm

These cards are a great idea. I use cards for ideas and research material. I think I’m with Silver on this but “To write faster:plan first. set a timer .Edit later.” is the best.
Carole Lyden’s last blog post ..Who stole your confidence?
- TNeal on May 29, 2012 at 5:07 pm
  
  I’d agree with the “…set timer…” choice. I’m drawn to the two cards with the word “plan” in them. As a seat-of-the-pants writer, I find planning a weaker discipline for me, yet I’m recognizing the important of organizing and directing my thoughts before hitting the keyboard.
  - Ali on May 29, 2012 at 9:55 pm
    
    Thanks Carole, and TNeal. My talk at BlogWorld is on editing, so that was coming through as a theme a bit … and I firmly believe that good planning means much less editing!
Laura Howard on May 29, 2012 at 5:09 pm

These are fantastic Ali! So adorable!! Wants one!! 🙂
- Ali on May 29, 2012 at 9:57 pm
  
  Thanks, Laura! 🙂
Yoneco Evans on May 29, 2012 at 5:58 pm

I love cards from Moo! I’ve never tried the minis, but my business cards are from there. My favorite is “plan, write, edit, publish, repeat”.
- Ali on May 29, 2012 at 9:59 pm
  
  That was the first one I came up with — glad you like it, Yoneco! 🙂 Moo are awesome, aren’t they? All my business cards are from them. Thinking of making stickers in the future..!
Donna Brown on May 29, 2012 at 6:12 pm

I love the cards, I would love to do the same! Great ideas!
- Ali on May 29, 2012 at 10:01 pm
  
  Thanks Donna! They were really easy to make (you basically just type in the text, choose a font, and choose a background pattern & colour — if I can do it, anyone can..!)
Giulietta Nardone on May 30, 2012 at 6:46 pm

Great idea! Someone suggested Moo to create some cards and I forgot about it. Thank you for the reminder. I also like the shorter ones.

G.
Giulietta Nardone’s last blog post ..Time, Would We Really Want To Save It In A Bottle?
- Ali on May 31, 2012 at 6:09 pm
  
  Thanks, Giulietta! Hope you get a chance to make some Moo cards of your own. 🙂
Sandee on June 1, 2012 at 8:19 am

I think you should think about actually printing them (maybe actually business-card sized, for older eyes?) I would definitely buy the set to post on my wall for inspiration!
~ Sandee
- Ali on June 1, 2012 at 4:09 pm
  
  I never thought of people wanting to buy them, Sandee! I think that’s possible through Moo, but only in quite large sets (50 cards or more). Will have a think about how I might be able to provide them… thanks. 🙂
Sabina on June 1, 2012 at 8:07 pm

I like “Plan, Write, Edit, Publish, Repeat” 🙂
farouk on June 3, 2012 at 10:30 am

very inspiring Ali
thank you 🙂
Lena on June 3, 2012 at 11:36 am

Although I feel one of them looks cluttered, this is a great idea. I especially love the one with “Build traffic: ….”
Lena’s last blog post ..Would You Take Me For A Friend?
- Ali on June 4, 2012 at 10:32 am
  
  Thanks, Lena! I did them in a bit of a hurry, so the design definitely has room for improvement…!