All posts by Robin

I'm a woman in my early thirties living in North Carolina, USA, and I have a lot of varied interests; I love creative writing, music composition, web design, surfing the Internet, thinking out loud, and gaming. And yes, my glasses are crooked. :)

Wednesday in the Word

Think You’ve Seen Family Hostility? Genesis Shows Us Worse

April 25, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

Genesis 16:3-5; Genesis 25:12-18

16:3 So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived. When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my servant in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the Lord judge between you and me.”

25:12 This is the account of the family line of Abraham’s son Ishmael, whom Sarah’s slave, Hagar the Egyptian, bore to Abraham…18 His descendants settled in the area from Havilah to Shur, near the eastern border of Egypt, as you go toward Ashur. And they lived in hostility toward all the tribes related to them.

Here, we see hostility spilling down the generations. Sarai (later Sarah) and Hagar despise each other (mostly over the fact of Hagar being fertile and Sarah being barren at this point), which leads to their sons and further descendants hating each other.

Ever had a feud in your family that went on so long you even forgot what it was about? I think just about every family has. Yes, every family, even the most Christian of families, has feuds with each other at some point, and it’s something we have to deal with in a Godly way.

Feuds, Big or Small, are Threats to Our Faith

Some families split right down the middle when it comes to a specific issue, something as small as a sports feud right up to an irreconcilable difference on faith. Sometimes finances and relationship strife get in the way of togetherness; sometimes job stress distances a family so that togetherness is a foreign concept. Or, as Sarah and Hagar show us, sometimes the issue between you is so petty and stupid that you can’t even justify why you’re mad at each other.

But why continue to live in a condition which we ourselves hate? Why keep up hostility that ends up separating us from God (because who can worship when you’re focusing on how much you hate so-and-so)? The anger between Sarah and Hagar illustrates how negative emotions can pull us away from the will of God, and that still happens to even the most God-fearing of families.

How to Fix It? COMMUNICATE!

What we must do is to work to bring ourselves back together again. For the Christian family, focusing on bringing God back into the house is a huge step–the family that worships together plays together better, too, and the family that prays together is more in tune with each other. When you worship and pray together, you’re more likely to be talking about more things together, which, in time, may lead to old issues being aired and normal family communication being restored.

But even if you aren’t Christian, family communication is of utmost importance. After all, when family members take meals in separate rooms staring at different television screens and you go a whole day without speaking to one another, how can you communicate–how can you heal?

Tuesday on the Soapbox

My Life as Tetris (A Poem)

April 24, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

I think we’ve all been here at one point or another…LOL

So many Z-bars stacked up on one side
and all I need
is one straight bar

Piles and piles of L-bars and T-bars
carefully arranged on the other side
and all I need
is one measly straight bar

But alas, the lovely simplicity
of a quick reward
eludes me

Maybe if I keep stacking these pieces
with no gaps,
I’ll get a bigger payoff
when I do get a straight bar

But for now I just have to stack them further
and pray they don’t tumble in on my head
before I get that last blasted straight bar

Monday in the HTMLab

Your Site’s First Impression: Its Domain Name

April 23, 2012 Robin 1 Comment

Have a great site, but no one’s visiting? Strangely enough, it might be your domain name itself that’s turning people off.

A great domain name is like a confident smile and a welcoming handshake–it greets visitors for you and gives them an idea of what your site’s about. If yours is lackluster, you might get some visits, but not a whole lot, even if your content is great.

To help you choose a domain name, whether for the first time or the fiftieth time, I have written the following article. Read on for tips and even a few hacks to get just the right domain name for your site!

The Shorter and More Descriptive Your URL, the Better

“www.robinstotallyawesomeonlinebookstore.com” is going to get significantly less visits than, say, “www.robinsbooks.com”, simply because the latter URL is easier to remember and easier to type.

If at all possible, choose the shortest and yet most descriptive domain name available. This way, you’ll get more return visits and word-of-mouth spreading, plus more people will be willing to type in the domain name manually (and be more willing to link to you, too!).

Not convinced you need a shorter domain name? Look at it this way: who would type in Facebook’s URL manually (or even remember it well) if the URL was “www.findallyourfriendsandstalkthem.com”? (No matter how fitting that domain name might be…LOL)

You May Not Need a .Com

Unless you’re selling stuff actively on your site, a .com domain suffix is not entirely necessary. It’s great if you can find a .com you like, but chances are that the .com name you like is probably taken already, given how many people use the Internet these days. Finding a domain suffix that is just as fitting will work well for you if you find yourself in this situation.

In fact, matching your domain suffix to your site’s purpose can be even more informative for your visitors (and can help to make or break your site’s first impression). See the following list for details on popular domain suffixes:

What Domain Suffixes Mean for Visitors

“.com”: Possibly a commerce site, can also be a basic informational or interactive internet site
“.net”: A little internet hub, likely run by one person or a small group of people
“.org”: Either a small personal site, a non-profit organization, or a slightly educational site
“.biz”: Possibly a good business site, but more likely to be shadier and more ad-ridden than a “.com” site
“.info”: 99% possibility of being A) a virus-laden site; B) a site with fake downloads resulting in a spyware infection; C) full of copied or robot-generated content that makes no sense
“.edu”: a genuine school’s website
“.mobi”: a site designed mainly for mobile devices, which will look strange on full monitors
“.nu”: Like “.net”, but “cooler” and for more experienced personal site owners (also way more expensive)
“.tv”: A real TV show’s official website
“.me”: Even more personal than a “.net” or “.org,” and even “cooler” than a “.nu”
“.xxx”: Eek, I’m on the company computer, I shouldn’t be on this! (kidding)

See a complete list of all domain suffixes here @ ComputerHope.com.

Wordplay Works in Your Favor

If you can, include clever wordplay in your domain name to make it memorable. Silly as it might seem, this can really boost your image in users’ minds, as well as make your site a lot easier to return to. Alliteration, rhyming, puns, word combos, and even domain hacks (you’ll see what I mean) can give your domain just the right amount of oomph.

Alliteration

For instance, you can include some or all words beginning with the same letter (alliteration) in your domain name. This can make your site easier to remember because it includes a lot of the same letter or words beginning with the same letter.

Some examples:

WithinMyWorld.org itself (if I do say so myself :P)
BeautyBlitz
GirlsWhoGeek
Mixed-Metaphor
WhoWhatWear

Also, implied alliteration works for sites like ReadWriteWeb (the implied repeated “r” sound).

Assonance and Rhyming

Assonance and rhyming (similar vowel and consonant sounds across a word or phrase) also sound and look nice to website visitors. Domain names like lookbook.nu and desiretoinspire.net are more memorable because they use these tricks. Not only do these sites sound more pleasant to the ear, they also sound more legitimate and well-kept–like someone actually cares about running them.

Puns and Word Combinations

You can also have a little fun with your domain name’s actual words, while still making it descriptive of your site’s content. Puns are awesome for this, as well as combining words together to make a shorter yet still descriptive URL. Including humor or a tongue-in-cheek joke as part of your domain name can work magic–we humans always remember things better with humor. Some examples:

So Much Pun (so much fun with puns)
Autocowrecks (autocorrects that wreck communication)
Overskill (skill overkill)
Architypes (pun on the word “archetype,” meaning defined type/model–the site is about types of architecture)
FreeCycle (recycle for free)
Musicovery (music discovery)

Using the Domain Suffix as Part of the Word

Though Delicious has long since dropped the “del.icio.us” domain name, it was still an awesome way to get a shorter domain name without losing any of the site name. This is called a domain hack, at least according to Wikipedia.

Examples of domain hacks include TheDailyWh.at, Instagr.am, Youtu.be, and Scrumptio.us, among many, many others. Use of country-specific domain suffixes is almost necessary when trying to construct a domain hack; you also want to pick an unusual word that defines your site without being too campy.

These wordplay tricks are all clever ways to both get your audience’s attention and get across the meaning of your site as well. After all, isn’t that what a domain name is about?

P.S. Numbers in your domain name can be too cutesy, but for sites like decor8, it shortens the domain name right up without being too kiddy. All the same, use numbers in your name with caution!

Make Sure Your Desired Name Doesn’t Have Shady Ties in the Past

The best way to check about a particular domain name, once you’ve settled on one that you want, is to run it through Whois.sc‘s lookup. This will get you a good bit of information on what kind of site owned your desired name in the past.

Why is this a good idea? Well, for instance, you want to make sure your desired name doesn’t have ties to pornography and other such activity–domain names like “whitehouse.com” and even “jesuschrist.com” have been tied to porn sites in the past. You don’t want to get hold of your dream domain name only to find out that people are avoiding it because it used to be a VERY different site.

If you have to, pay for a complete history of the domain name before you buy it–paying a little now can save you headaches in the future!

Where to Buy Domain Names?

GoDaddy.com (I’ve been personally registered with them since 2004 and have had good service)
NameCheap.com
Register.com
Domains.org
Name.com
DynoNames.com

Know of any other good domain registrars? Tell me in the comments!

Saturday with the Spark

Organize Your Creativity with Bubble Maps

April 21, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

Around third grade, I was taught how to draw something like the following illustration:

Using this, we were told, you could expand out ideas based on a central concept. You’d put the seed of the idea in the middle of the map, and then write more details about the idea in the outer “bubbles”. This was called a “Bubble Map,” one of the many thinking maps we learned how to do that year (see examples of other thinking maps in this PDF).

We often used these in school to get our thoughts together before writing a rough draft of a report, or to record observations on a specific concept. And there are several other uses for them, according to this eHow article.

Mostly science, language, and history used these thought-organization tools…but it occurred to me recently to try using a bubble map in particular to expand on a creative idea.

Why I Chose the Bubble Map Form

The structure of a bubble map is quite adaptable to any idea you want to explore, and its creation is simple; considering that my motivation for creative things has been somewhat lacking of late, I knew I needed something that was simple and adaptable for my use as a visual “thought prop”, to allow myself to flesh out an idea without feeling so daunted and overwhelmed.

Examples of Creative-Idea Bubble Maps

Seeing your thoughts visually organized like this can boost your creativity, as I found out while constructing the following two examples:

This one depicts ideas on my newest layout ideas for WithinMyWorld.org. Notice how I’m tackling many facets of design–usability/legibility, color choice, image and link styles. Bubble maps are great for doing this; the only limit to what you put in the “bubbles” is how big you drew the bubble to start with!

In this bubble map, I’m thinking hard about the various style details of a new song, describing the “mood” of the music, how to play the melody and accompaniment, how to style lyrics, etc. Bubble maps are very good for fleshing out minute details–stuff you would usually think of in a burst of inspiration and then forget.

Learn How to Make Your Own Bubble Maps

Aside from the time-honored pencil-and-paper method described in this eHow article, you can also do as I did and create one digitally using your favorite image-creation program (I used Microsoft Paint). With later editions of Microsoft Word, you can also do SmartArt Graphics that mimic some aspects of bubble maps and other thinking maps, as well. (Learn more about how to make SmartArt graphics here.)

And, if you want to build your bubble map digitally and easily online, there are actually several online apps that you can use. These are NIFTY 🙂

Don’t Think These Would Work for You?

Well, what if I told you that the song I describe in the second bubble map wasn’t even on the list of creative projects until I started trying to do a bubble map about music? Within moments of finishing the map, I was inspired to go to the keyboard and start messing around with a totally new melody.

If these things can jump-start my creativity in these days of headaches and mental fatigue…well, they might just save the world, who knows? GO BUBBLE MAPS! 😀

Friday around the Web

10 Marriage “Rules” to Break, How Women and Men See Colors, Pencil Stop-Motion Video, and YouShouldHaveAlsoSeenThis

April 20, 2012 Robin 1 Comment

10 Marriage “Rules” You Should Break
Rules we’ve all grown up hearing, but which might not be the best advice.

How Women and Men See Colors
“Honey, I like the puce curtains, but these mauve ones over here are pretty, too. Which should I go with?”
“Uhhhh…they’re both pink, aren’t they?”

920 Pencils + Camera + PATIENCE = This Stop-Motion Video
😀 Get ready to smile–this music video is geekily creative! (No pencils were harmed in the making of this video. ^_^)

YouShouldHaveAlsoSeenThis.com
99 more awesome, hilarious, shocking, or life-changing things across the Internets that you should experience.

Thursday in the Zone

Solutions for “Flyaway Dice”

April 19, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

If you roll dice like me, you often spend more time picking dice up off the floor rather than rolling them across the table. To get any kind of decent result, you have to throw the dice, or at least I do. Unfortunately, this often results in bowling over my miniatures figures and a momentary pause in the game while we search for a missing d6 or d20. (We joke that I go “bowling for Clix” on a regular basis.)

But, since a dice rolling off the table becomes invalid, how can we stop dice from going everywhere? I’ve tried a number of solutions for my flyaway dice, and have come up with “what works” and “what doesn’t work.”

What Works

Using a box lid to roll dice in
Rolling against a pile of books or the side of a game box
Playing the game on a table with a raised edge around the tabletop (1/2 inch to 1 inch in height)

What Doesn’t Work

Rolling the dice around in your hand in cramped motions rather than larger motions*
Trying to keep the dice only on one tiny part of the table
Rolling directly on the miniatures map (if not held down by plexiglas)

*This causes uniformly terrible dice rolls–more Crit Misses than average, and much lower numbers in general. A full-bodied throw results in more “average” or “high” roll results–more sixes, sevens, and eights on a pair of d6s, and more 10s, 11s, and 12s on a d20. I believe this is because the dice don’t have a lot of chance to move around and settle on different numbers when you’re not moving your hand very much.

Awesome Things Happen…WHEN We Believe

April 18, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

Luke 8:49-55

49 While Jesus was still speaking, someone came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue ruler. “Your daughter is dead,” he said. “Don’t bother the teacher anymore.” 50 Hearing this, Jesus said to Jairus, “Don’t be afraid; just believe, and she will be healed.”

51 When he arrived at the house of Jairus, he did not let anyone go in with him except Peter, John and James, and the child’s father and mother. 52 Meanwhile, all the people were wailing and mourning for her. “Stop wailing,” Jesus said. “She is not dead but asleep.” 53 They laughed at him, knowing that she was dead.

54 But he took her by the hand and said, “My child, get up!” 55 Her spirit returned, and at once she stood up. Then Jesus told them to give her something to eat.

In this part of Luke, Jesus had just talked to the woman who had touched His cloak and was healed, and Jairus had already talked to Jesus about his daughter. Suddenly, a random guy comes back from Jairus’ house and tells him that his daughter is dead. But Jesus is unruffled, even though Jairus is probably shocked and overwhelmed with this news. Jesus already knows that Jairus’ daughter can be healed.

When Jesus gets to Jairus’ house, people are already mourning in the streets (likely the girl’s family members). He even tells the mourners that the girl is not dead, but they don’t listen–their eyes, and their human knowledge, tell them otherwise. So Jesus goes into the house, bringing with Him only His closest disciples, and in only a few moments, the girl is up walking around! A miracle has truly been wrought!

We, too, have a hard time believing Jesus can come through for us when the worst happens. When our senses and our human wisdom tell us that something is impossible or irreparable, we tend to believe that rather than trusting in God. The mourners certainly didn’t trust Jesus’ judgment, and already one visitor to Jairus’ house believes the girl is already lost to them. But Jairus, while probably shaken, still trusts in Jesus enough to bring Him physically into his house, and for that act of faith and trust, his daughter is brought back from the dead.

When we trust in God, giving the entire situation over to Him, amazing things happen. Illness is healed (we’ve seen three incidents of inexplicable healing in our church alone); relationships are saved; troubles unravel and vanish. For that matter, I’ve experienced it in my own life, feeling depression unwrap its dark tendrils from my mind as I grow stronger in my faith, so it’s not a delusion. I’ve lived as a skeptic of prayer and lived as a believer in prayer, and I know which lifestyle I much prefer, for the sheer number of prayers I’ve seen answered right in front of me.

“Believing” is not simply a matter of praying once about it, kinda hoping God will come through for you, and then going back to trying to fix the problem yourself. You must pray consistently about it, believe that God is who He says He is, and believe that He has the power to fulfill your need. Believing, just simple, childlike believing, has wrought even modern-day miracles.

Tuesday on the Soapbox

Bullying After School Hours: Cyberbullying

April 17, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

It used to be, even when I was a kid, that even if you got bullied at school, you could go home and get away from them if you didn’t live near them. There was a certain safety in “home;” it could be largely free of such pointless drama. But no longer can you leave “school drama” at school, if you’re a student.

These days, bullying, petty squabbles, and other distasteful hallmarks of student life follow you home via the Internet. Kids at school can find you online, especially if you have social media accounts, and their torment online is recorded for posterity unless you delete it all. And even then, the remarks they make have likely been seen by others, and have possibly been shared.

I am SO glad I did not grow up in this era of being digitally inter-tangled with the rest of the kids I went to school with. I was bullied enough during the school day itself–I can’t imagine what it would have been like to come home from school, knowing that nasty written comments were likely waiting for me as soon as I got onto Internet at home.

Bullying is Deadlier than Ever

I am not the first to write about these kinds of incidents, most certainly, but the issue of bullying or harassing others on the Internet needs constant attention, so that future generations know about it, and know that it is a cruel, cowardly, and mean-spirited act. Just as verbal bullying has finally gotten worldwide attention, so must the digital form of bullying.

The much-publicized suicide death of Megan Meier in 2005 after being harassed on Myspace (more information via Wikipedia), as well as other deaths because of online bullying, are warning signals for us, as parents, as teachers, and as members of society. Not only have kids seemingly gotten nastier to each other over the years, they have also latched on to new forms of technology as ways of tormenting other students, and that torment takes an emotional toll that may never completely fade.

For instance, I still hear the taunting voices of those idiot girls in the middle-school gym locker room every time I try on a pair of pants that isn’t quite big enough. I still remember how they managed to holler and still sound sing-song as they chanted “Fat girl, fat girl, stupid whale fat girl” as I hid from them in the locker room bathroom stall. And those words weren’t emblazoned on a computer screen anywhere, where people unrelated to the problem could read the words and share them with others. The hateful words were ephemeral (however long they’ve lasted in my memory aside); words said on the Internet are out there for all who want to see and share.

How do We Combat This?

Trying to combat cyberbullying is as difficult as fighting verbal and physical bullying in schools. As much as teachers may try to keep it from happening, they simply cannot be everywhere and hear everything at once. Incidents will slip through their fingers, try as they might; I should know, I tried to stop all the bullying in my own classrooms and ended up tired with no triumph in sight. Cyberbullying is just as difficult, if not more so, to police. How can you punish someone who is using an anonymous or assumed name, anyway?

But attempts should be made to educate students about what constitutes bullying/cyberbullying, as well as how to keep away from bullying online. Also, parents and teachers should be educated on how to document cases of cyberbullying (and its close cousin, cyberstalking), and how to talk to their kids/students about speaking and acting respectfully to other kids.

In my opinion, students who are being bullied online/after school hours should try the following:

Only accept friend-requests and follow requests from those people you like and trust.
Restrict access to your page to “Friends Only” or “Followers Only”.
Keep anyone who is not friends with your account from posting on your page.
Don’t give out your phone number to anyone but closest friends, so that bullies won’t call or text (that’s another, rarely-policed outlet for abuse!)
Create an online pseudonym for your profiles (with only the vaguest details about you), so that people from school/real life do not recognize you.
If all else fails, delete social network accounts so that other students have fewer online targets to hit.

Furthermore, parents and teachers can be part of the fight against cyberbullying by trying the following:

Educate kids that “bullying is bullying,” no matter where/when it happens, and it IS a big deal.
Make it clear that bullying can lead to other criminal acts against people, like robbery, battery, stalking, and murder. After all, if you devalue other people enough to insult them verbally or digitally, how long before you begin devaluing them enough to think that stealing from them is okay, or that killing them is okay?
Show kids that online comments can be traced back to them through IP addresses on computers and other devices–the Internet does not promise total anonymity. If their comments are serious enough, they could end up in jail.

These are only suggestions, but I believe these tips for students, parents, and teachers might help kids who are suffering this kind of after-hours bullying. (I hate thinking that bullying victims would have to police their online lives so severely, even resorting to “hiding” from online activity, but if it helps the situation blow over, it might be worth the temporary work and inconvenience.) I remember all too well going through bullying on school grounds–the last thing any kid needs is to have that stuff follow them home.

For More Information

Cyberbullying

National Crime Prevention Council
Cyberbullying info @ Wikipedia
StopCyberBullying.org
StopBullying.gov – Cyberbullying

Cyberstalking

Cyberstalking @ Reference.com
Cyberstalking @ Wikipedia

More about the MySpace Suicide Case

How Myspace suicide might change laws on Internet privacy, terms of service, and criminal culpability
Verdict of Myspace suicide case and its aftermath

Monday in the HTMLab

Your Page is Being Frequented by (Internet) Robots

April 16, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

Though many of us webdesigners and developers don’t realize it, many of our page hits come from robots, usually known as Web crawlers or “bots”, which index our pages for various search engines and the like.

Bots like these are (generally) harmless, and indeed we designers should be glad for the innocuous presence of anything that helps our pages get better known. According to this article, they can help validate links and HTML, and they can monitor changes in your web page so that search results which turn up your site are as updated as possible.

You do, however, have to be watchful for those few malicious bots, according to this site about web robot abuse, that look to harvest email addresses and other sensitive information for spam attacks; some bots might even be programmed to take down your server with specialized attacks.

To help you design and develop pages with bots and their indexing habits in mind, I have written the following short guide with plenty of sources to find more information. How you want to handle bots on your page depends entirely on how you view them. For example:

If You Don’t Mind Bots at All…

…then you don’t really have to do anything about your webpages. Just keep designing and coding as you have been, and bots will happily index and keep up with all your pages on your site(s).

I personally don’t mind them coming to my site–anything that helps my pages show up in Google Search is a happy thing. But lately, since I’ve been using my domain as a source for a bit of personal storage as well as officially published projects (losing data will make you paranoid), I’ve found myself thinking of how to keep bots out of certain folders. Thus, the section below:

If You’d Like to Keep Bots Out of Certain Folders…

This is where the humble robots.txt file comes into play. This file, usually kept in the top level of your site’s directory, is a list of instructions for robots to follow while visiting your site–most importantly, used to disallow access to certain files and folders that you’d rather not have indexed.

So, for instance, if I wanted to keep bots out of a folder called “mine”, I’d write this little tidbit in my own robots.txt file:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /mine/

(The “User-agent: *” bit tells every robot that visits, “This applies to you, so listen carefully.”)

If, however, I wanted to disallow access to two folders, “mine” and “yours”, I’d need to write my robots.txt file this way:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /mine/
Disallow: /yours/

For everything you want to keep bots out of, you have to write a specific Disallow line. Kind of like keeping kids out of the various cabinets in your house–if you don’t tell them specifically they can’t get into it…well… LOL

And just like some kids deliberately disobey your pleas to keep out of certain drawers and cabinets, there are some bots who will ignore your robots.txt file completely. The only way to be completely sure a bot isn’t indexing your stuff is to take it off your site…sad.

Even more awesomely in-depth information about the robots.txt file can be found at RobotsTxt.org (very well-explained and detailed!).

If You Just Want Bots to Keep Out Altogether…

Of course, if you’ve had a bad experience with phishing and spamming bots, you might just want them all to buzz off. For this, such tags as the following have been invented (courtesy of this page):

<meta name=”robots” content=”noindex,nofollow”>

Put this meta tag in the header of your page, and it’s a virtual “Keep Out” sign for bots everywhere. Only do this, however, if you’re sure you don’t want anything on your site to be indexed, not even by the “good” bots.

Summary

Bots are an often-forgotten portion of web development, but with all the various search engines (and spammers, unfortunately) out there on the big ole Internet, we developers have to at least take them into consideration. I hope you’ve gained some insight on how to either welcome bots to portions of your sites, or how to keep them out!

Learn More about All Sorts of Web Bots

InternetOfficer.com has a complete list of web robots for your perusal, so if you check your web stats and see a number of hits from several strange names, you can check this list and see if a bot’s been visiting you.

Saturday with the Spark

The More Outlandish the Idea, the Better

April 14, 2012 Robin Leave a comment

Ever come up with an idea that was just so silly you couldn’t take it seriously?

Or what about a concept that completely disregards all the rules?

In reality, these crazy, far-flung ideas may be the key to thinking more creatively. You just can’t allow yourself to dismiss them before they help.

Why “Outlandish” Ideas Actually Aren’t

When we’re trying to do anything, whether it’s solving a problem or coming up with a new idea, we sometimes lock our mental processes within certain boundaries, sometimes without realizing it. We follow the rules society has laid down for righting this particular problem, or we cling tightly to the types of ideas that have been successful in the past.

Now, I’m not saying throw aside all rules, regulations, and useful advice. It’s good to remember what’s been successful, and it’s good to remember what society generally likes. But it’s definitely not good to keep ourselves locked within rules when we’re trying to come up with something very new and different. “Thinking outside the box,” an innovative phrase repeated so often that it’s become cliche, really means setting yourself free from what you think you “ought” to come up with, and allowing the creative process to come more naturally and freely.

Examples of Outlandish Creative Ideas

For instance, Mary Shelley’s vision of a monster cobbled together from various body parts might have seemed outlandish, but it certainly laid the foundation for a genuinely spooky and sad tale–Frankenstein. And Edgar Rice Burroughs’ concept of how a man could live on Mars erupted into series of books, which laid the groundwork for the science fiction literary genre for over half a century, even up to the present day. (Burroughs is the author behind the book which the “John Carter” movie comes from.)

Other so-called “crazy” ideas are now commonplace to us. The automobile itself was considered more a novelty than a necessity, even when it first rolled off the production line. And when I read one of my cousins’ textbooks from the ’70s talking about corded phones which showed the face of the person you were talking to, no one ever dreamed it could really be possible–the cordless, wireless iPhone and its FaceTime were still nearly 40 years in the future.

Getting Hold of Your Own “Crazy” Ideas

So, how do you come up with your own wacky creative ideas that just might take off?

Make a promise to yourself that you will pursue and develop every idea that pops into your head, without laughing it away or dismissing it out of hand.

Start brainstorming, about whatever you need a creative idea for.

For instance, do you need an idea for a story’s villain? Start thinking about actions, voice types, facial expressions, clothing, and dialogue that you personally associate with being villainous, and expand on that. This will inevitably lead to developing a backstory or a “reason for being evil”–run with it. Trust me, you will like where it ends up if you let your mind wander. (I did this very process with my own novel’s villain, who didn’t exist until one of my very earliest readers pointed out that I didn’t have a real villain in my book yet.)

Document how your idea grows and changes. Sounds weird, but if you keep track of your original idea and the subsequent changes you’ve made to it, you’ll be better able to fall back on earlier changes if you need to. Plus, even if one little detail of an idea doesn’t work in one context, you could easily use it somewhere else. It’s good to hoard your ideas!

Don’t discount your dreams. If you find yourself dreaming about your idea (which often happens, if you’ve been concentrating on it a lot!), write down what you dreamed about as soon as you get up. Your sleeping mind might just come up with the solution to the last troubling little detail. (Don’t laugh, it’s happened to me before–I dreamed about taking a final exam, and one of the “questions” was actually an answer to the thing I couldn’t figure out before I went to bed. WIN)

If someone else thinks your idea is “weird”, let them think that. Until your idea is fully fleshed out, it might sound a little far-fetched to others, and that, contrary to popular belief, is OKAY. Don’t let anyone’s disapproval get in the way until you have sorted the idea out for yourself. If they have constructive criticism, like my friend’s suggestion that my book needed a stronger villain, that’s awesome; if they just brush your idea aside, then they’re proving they don’t need to be part of your creative process.

If this idea doesn’t work, take it apart and try again. The idea you come up with might or might not work. If it doesn’t, take the non-working bits out and refashion them, as many times as you need to. Ideas are not like laptop computers, whose parts seem specifically made to work with only a scant few other brands of components. Ideas are endlessly flexible and reparable, and best of all, you need only one tool–your brain!