The 15 minute blank page trick saved my whole outline

I kept staring at prompts and freezing up. Every time I tried to outline a story, I'd get 3 sentences in and delete everything. Then I found this thing where you set a timer for 15 minutes and just write the worst possible version of your idea. No fixing, no thinking, just pure garbage on the page. After the timer goes off, you pick one dumb sentence from the mess and build the actual outline around it. Tried it with a prompt about a vending machine that only dispenses memories. Got 14 minutes of nonsense but one line said "the coin slot smelled like my grandfather's garage" and that became the whole plot. Has anyone else got a weird little trick like this to bust through the blank page? What's yours?

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dakota_nelson4318d agoMost Upvoted

Hang on, the coin slot smelled like his grandfather's garage? That's the weirdest and most specific thing I've ever heard come out of a garbage draft. I'm honestly a little jealous of your brain for coming up with that one!