Over the past few days, I was thinking a lot about the crazy thoughts and ideas that get stuck in my head. If you get a song stuck in your head, that’s called an earworm. There are numerous ways to get rid of the unwanted songs in your head, but there are those you want to remember. One of the ways to get rid of the entire songs or snippet from the songs is to play the song, whether online or from a CD. However, I have done that, and a certain segment of the song in my head gets royally stuck, and I definitely can’t get rid of it, because I am so drawn to that certain chord progression. This type of earworm is difficult to get rid of.
You may think this is about songs that get stuck in your head, right? Wrong. I not only get bits and pieces, or maybe even entire songs stuck in my head, but there are other sounds, creative thoughts, and observations about the world around me that I either can’t get my head around, or that just won’t turn loose. For instance, if I meet a person who has different values, aspects of his or her culture or different abilities that I can’t seem to let go of. Different types of disabilities even fascinate me. For example, I read a couple of novels that featured characters with Asperger’s syndrome, the high end of the Autism spectrum. Not only was I fascinated to learn about the disability itself, but there was something about one of the characters hearing the sound of plans dying. I didn’t actually hear this sound for myself, but I read online about the sound of corn stalks making a popping sound when they are dying of thirst.
Sometimes the simple sound of a phone’s ringer shorting out can get stuck in my head, or any weird sound that signifies as a problem with an electronic piece of equipment, or even the oddest sound in a vehicle. For instance, I remember one time when I was a kid at the Georgia Academy for the Blind, and the intercom system started squeaking on a very rainy day. No matter whether the secretaries were making announcements or trying to communicate with the teachers, the system would emit a high pitched squeal. I remember having a dream about that very glitch with the intercom, years later.
Although some may think my thought process is strange, I strongly believe that my thought process leads to my creativity. For instance, if I get a scene stuck in my head, it won’t let go of me until I write it down. Remember the article about the CB radio I posted a while back? That is just one example of a creative idea that I couldn’t turn loose of.
Here’s my question for you: Have you ever gotten an unusual thought that you couldn’t let go of? How did it influence your writing? Did it inspire some other aspect of creativity or did the thought lead you to conduct further research on the topic surrounding it? Leave your feedback either in the comments below, or by filling out my contact form. Happy reading and God bless each and every one of you.
