Shower Power

Inspiration is a fickle creature. It seems to like to strike you most often when there is very little you can do capitalize on it. In the middle of a meeting at work, stuck in traffic, right before you fall asleep, or even during a heated hostage situation. Inspiration almost seem to take sick pleasure in taunting this way, forcing us to try and remember whatever great idea it gave us until we can write it down or bring it to fruition. It really is like being bitten by a venomous creature. Such things never happen conveniently outside of hospitals, no, they always happen in deserts or out in the wilderness somewhere. Then, you just have to hold on, you have to survive until you can get to a hospital and even then, hope it isn't too late to save you. Rattlesnakes and inspiration are perhaps the exact same creature.

Except for one instance, at least for me, inspiration follows the above pattern, but I can manufacture it, force it out of hiding if you will, milk its' venom.

Showers, nothing special, just a shower. I am not sure if it is the sort of sensory deprivation that a long hot shower gives you that helps to let the ideas flow, or maybe it is just the relaxing nature of a good shower. I haven't ever pinpointed why showers work, but I have learned that nearly every time, they do help produce inspiration. I suppose the only exception to the rule is if I find myself showering with someone else, often times in those scenarios, inspiration couldn't get into my head if it wanted to.

The best part about the shower induced inspiration is that you can easily just turn the shower off and go make whatever idea you had, become a reality. At the very least, you can write down the idea or start planning it out, but for me it is usually writing related, so I can just turn off the shower, dry off and go write. I'd say a good 40% of everything I have ever written, I wrote while wearing just a towel. The idea will come and I won't feel the need to dress, just to get it out, set it free.

Hell, I am writing this entry in just a towel and if you know me, then you are welcome for the mental image

Here's to showers and rattlesnakes! May they never coexist.