What's a Timed Writing?

A timed writing is simply that - you sit down at the keyboard or with a notebook and just write for a specified amount of time. I recommend ten or fifteen minutes at first - much like running, you need to build up your stamina.

The important thing in a timed writing is the act of writing. Give yourself permission to write dreck - the quality of the writing is not the point, and it'll take a while before you're not just writing "I don't know what to write I don't know what to write" over and over again. Eventually, though, your brain will get tired of that and start producing some interesting stuff.

Put the timed writing away for a while and go back to it when you want to mine it for ideas. A notebook filled with timed writings is a grat resource - go through with a highlighter and mark the things that spark something: great first lines, interesting metaphor, or that passage of description that emerged in the middle of typing "I don't know what to write."

One writing book that delves more deeply into this area is Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones. It's a good book for sparking ideas, and highly recommended.