How Traveling Can Fuel Your Writing
Any great story begins with an adventure.
As a writer who suffers from writer’s block more times than she cares to admit, I can honestly say traveling is a key to unlocking a writer’s mind.
At the age of 6, I knew I wanted to be an author. I used my little brain’s big imagination to create wild stories of animals living in townhouses and ladybugs gaining their spots by winning baking competitions. But as I got older, it seemed as if my imagination was harder to come by.
Naturally, I blame it on the stress and daily duties that come with growing up and “adulting.” For a while, I stopped writing all together. With college life encompassing the air around me, it was difficult to find a few moments to jot down a few creative thoughts or even think with the right side my brain for that matter.
It wasn’t until I took the summer off to travel around Europe I found my inspiration for writing all over again.
My trip started in a mix of rain and sunshine in London. The traffic and bustle around the city sparked creativity all around me. There were these storage containers turned into little shops and cafes. The aesthetic alone was enough to inspire me to inspire stories of hideaway places.
I brought a journal along with me on the trip in hopes I would be motivated to write. After a few days in London, I began free-writing every day.
Each journal entry was simple. I wrote about the things I saw or overheard while traveling around foreign cities.
While in Paris, I described in detail how the lights of the Eiffel Tower seem to shine brighter than all of New York City at the beginning of each hour. I also described the robbery I witnessed while enjoying dinner outside of a French restaurant.
In Amsterdam, I penned my emotional experience at the Anne Frank museum and wrote the story of how I almost died while riding a bike (which was about triple the size of me) dodging traffic on the busy Holland streets.
The Swiss Alps made me realize that sometimes, words are not strong enough to depict the true beauty of the Earth’s masterpieces. So instead of writing about the immense beauty I saw in the mountains, I jot down how emboldening that once in a lifetime view made me feel.
Italy took me back to my familial roots. The romantic atmosphere of Venice ignited a new creative side to my writing. I found myself writing about the ancestors I’ve never met which had grown up in Sicily. I even conjured up different stories about how my great-great-grandparents could have fallen in love.
And so on and so forth, I utilized my adventures to not only inspire me to continue writing but to also motivate me to want to write that book I have dreamed about for so long. While it’s nothing more than just a work in progress, I am happy to finally begin working on my book ideas.
Without the experiences I had abroad, I never would have been able to reconnect with my creative side. Traveling is the ideal way to connect with new people, new cultures and new adventures that inspire you to fill your blank pages with beautiful prose and fulfill your dreams.
My dream is just getting started. Where will traveling take yours?
Kayla Keller is an intern with Blooming Twig and studies Linguistics, English and Writing at Stony Brook University.
