Stumbled on a stat about how many story ideas we actually use

I was scrolling through some writing blogs last night and found a breakdown that said most writers only develop about 10% of the ideas they jot down. That hit me because I have three notebooks full of prompts and maybe finished five stories from them. I went back and counted my saved ideas in Google Docs, and yep, I've got 47 concepts but only 4 fully written pieces. Anybody else sit on way more ideas than they ever turn into something?

2 comments

2 Comments

blakem371mo ago

That 10% stat is generous. Most ideas just aren't worth finishing.

mila_flores81mo ago

lol that 10% stat hits hard. I've got a whole folder on my phone called "maybe later" with like 60 entries and I've pulled maybe 5 of them into something real. What finally helped me was setting a timer for 15 minutes and just forcing myself to pick one idea and write the first scene without any pressure. No editing, no planning, just throwing words at the page until that timer goes off. It broke me out of the "saving ideas for later" trap because later never comes unless you start right now.