March 2023
Your free monthly creative writing prompt
Hi!
How are you? It doesn’t seem like that long ago that I was absolutely lost, trying to write a February prompt. Lots of you read it and didn’t unsubscribe, so thank you.
This month, I’ve been looking forward to writing this prompt. The idea came to me on a walk.
Near to where I live, there is a series of footpaths, following streams and rivers, that join the town centre to a large park. Over the years some of these paths have been known by less than complimentary nicknames in my family: ‘dog doo alley’ for example. But recently, local groups, schools and charities have been working to clear the river banks, plant bulbs alongside the paths and improve the water quality. It isn’t perfect, but is turning into a lovely place to walk.
Anyway, I was walking along the river and something made me stop, a movement on the bank at the other side possibly. I stood there for a length of time before I realised that I had ‘zoned out’. I wasn’t thinking about anything, I wasn’t really noticing anything, just standing there. I filmed this short video for a friend who had asked me about meditation- because I realised that was really what I had been doing.
As I carried on my walk, I was reflecting on other times that I experience ‘zoning out’ when I remembered one of my favourite recent films: ‘Soul’. In the clip below you’ll see how the film depicts the musician losing themself in the music so that their soul (as it transpires) is transported to another place.
I’m not sure that me zoning out by a river is quite the same, but, how many of us describe the way we feel when we are carried away with our writing as being ‘in the zone’?
Google has a lot to say about the origins of the phrase, but I like the first part of this etymology entry:
late 14c., from Latin zona "geographical belt, celestial zone,"
I then found myself questioning the connotations of ‘zoning out’ versus being ‘in the zone’. Does ‘zoning out’ have negative connotations? Are we blessed by a celestial being if we have the ability to find ‘the zone’ when we are creating? (Recently binged ‘Lucifer’ IFYKYK) Where are those people who used to ask me where I was when I was ‘away with the fairies’? I think they might have understood- but that’s another piece of writing!
Anyway, the prompt!
A few options:
Start writing and keep going until you feel ‘in the zone’- a stream of consciousness that could become absolutely anything- no rules.
Can you describe the feeling you have of ‘zoning out’ or being ‘in the zone’? Are they different?
allow a character you are writing at the moment to experience the celestial realm- adopt a splash of magical realism in your writing- you could use the clip from ‘Soul’ as inspiration.
I hope something here inspires you. Imagine something like this every week!
Paid subscribers are also the first to know about Scribbles news- later today there will be a journal announcement.
Enjoy,
Rachael xx
I'm lucky enough to belong to a newly formed writing group local to me, we meet IRL! Today I shared this prompt and wrote the following in response:
In the zone / Zoning out
“There are fairies at the bottom of the garden you know?”
My grandad said.
“Go and find them
Don’t trip.
Clean the leaves from your shoes before you come back in.”
“I can’t find them grandad, what do they look like?”
“Tiny little ladies in pretty dresses with sparkling wings.”
“Ok.”
The fairies weren’t there you know.
#
“Don’t mind her, she’s away with the fairies!”
Was I?
Eyes open but seeing nothing. Zoned out. A coping mechanism?
I wasn’t away with the fairies.
I was in the zone, I didn’t really hear:
The fire alarm
The question
The telling off
The fart
#
“Mum! Mum Mum!
Why are you ignoring us?”
I wasn’t, I was in the zone.
“Sorry darlings, I was away with the fairies then wasn’t I?”
I was in the zone,
Bills
Meal plans
Calenders
Social events
#
“Where’s mum?”
“Let her be, I think she’s in the zone.”
“Ok.”
I was, I was in the zone.
Another world, a house, three women, war, ghosts, transatlantic voyages, death, visitations, fairy hunting, learning from the generations, my world, but not mine, another zone, zoned out.
Away with the fairies.