Today, write about (or begin a story based on) the following quotation:

Disobedience, in the eyes of any one who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.
      ~ Oscar Wilde

If writing a journal entry or free-write, you might consider the place of disobedience in your life or the lives of those around you. Consider its virtues and problems. Of course, a piece of fiction involving disobedience can take so many forms and paths. Must someone find the strength to consider disobedience in order to do the right thing? Must someone find the strength to trust a superior rather than following the instinct to disobey? Situations are rarely clear-cut in real life–you might brainstorm some of the ways in which disobedience could be necessary or could cause severe problems within a given plot.

“Writer at work” magnet

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Today’s topic is redemption. For your exercise, do one of the following:

• Free-write about redemption for 10-20 minutes. What does it mean to you? How does it enter into your life or the lives of those around you? If you prefer a more fiction-oriented approach, how does it enter into fiction? How can it be used in plots and stories, either well or poorly?

• Brainstorm, write, or begin a story with a theme of redemption.
• Write a character portrait of someone who seeks redemption.

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With Valentine’s day upcoming, it’s time to think about what the ultimate gift of love would be. Do one of the following:

• Free-write for 10-20 minutes about what the ultimate gift of love might be.

• Free-write about what the ultimate gift of love between you and your significant other would be.
• Write a story depicting two people in love and a special gift that passes between them.

Blame Cupid

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Writing is often about touching and exploring some of the deepest human emotions. One of those is loss.

Today, write about the loss of a loved one. If you’ve never lost someone dear to you, write about how you think you’d feel, or write about the loss of a fictional character’s loved one. Exploring these emotions in ourselves can be very difficult, but it can make us better able to touch those feelings in others.

Write with grace Journal

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You’ve just won a chance to depart on the first commercial space flight to the first commercial moon base, but you have to leave tomorrow and you won’t be back for a month. Write a travelogue of your first few days or of occasional highlights of your trip.

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Here’s an odd little exercise for the day: most folks should be familiar by now with video games that eventually come out with “expansion packs.” These expansions often provide new game areas, new player character races or classes, new items, abilities, and professions, and so on. They might provide a whole new aspect to the gaming experience, advance a plotline, and so on.

So today, set a timer for 20-30 minutes and free-write about the following:

What if an expansion came out for real life?

This could lead to a whole world of fascinating ideas!

Blame Cupid

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This exercise may seem morbid, but hear me out for a moment. Today, write your own obituary as it would read if you’d died yesterday. This may be difficult, and it may touch a few raw nerves, but that’s all right as long as you can handle it. While there are certainly writers who stick with writing light, “fluffy” pieces and do quite well with it, many people write because they want to touch something in other people. Often that means we have to be in touch with our own deep, sometimes dark, feelings. Not all writers’ exercises are meant to be fun; some of them help us to face those feelings so we can better express them in our regular writing. So today, face some of those feelings.

Mid-(W)ife Crisis Value T-shirt

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You find a lamp in the sand at your favorite beach, in the desert, or other unexpected place. When you touch it a Jinn emerges and offers you one wish. What would you wish for? The following assumptions apply:

• Your Jinn has great powers, but not ultimate power. He cannot simply remake the world.

• Nothing you wish for can get you more wishes–you only get the one.
• As tends to be the case in so many tales of Jinn, the Jinn’s method for making your wish come true might not be exactly what you expect.
• Your wish must be simple; no legal documents!

Free-write about what you wish for, what the Jinn actually does in response to your wish, and what happens as a result. Consider giving the Jinn a personality that shapes his actions.

Write with precision Tile Box

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Today’s exercise is inspired by this FARK survey thread:

If you could be deity/god/goddess of anything, what would you be?

Free-write for 10-20 minutes before looking at the above-linked thread. You can be serious or silly, broad or specific. You can delve into the whys and wherefores of your choice or you can explore the traditions and celebrations of your worshippers. You could come up with your own creation myth if you’d like, describe your whims and tendencies, or anything else that comes to mind.

“Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake”

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Today’s prompt is a journaling prompt by way of a crafts blog:

[W]rite about current events and how they affect [you]. At least it will give those grandchildren some good fodder for when they have to write essays about what it might have been like to live in our day! I’m trying to include events that might “define” this age, such as the popularity of blogging, using the internet for social networking, and the Iraq War.

In other words, imagine that you’re leaving a little time-capsule-like legacy for your descendants, to give them a better understanding of what life was really like right now. How would you go about that? What would you include? Remember that given today’s multimedia focus you aren’t limited by pen and paper–you could always plan out a mix of writing, video clips, and so on. Either go ahead and start writing your legacy, or brainstorm a project that would serve as this legacy.

Word Nerd Large Mug

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