Creative Juices

Wow, it's been a pretty hectic summer, in the way only summers can be. Some parts good, some not so good, but definitely hectic. There have been camping trips, kids home from school, guests from overseas, summer camps, etc etc. In some ways it's been fabulous to be out of regular routine, just going with whatever the day or week brings us. In others, not so great.

The writer in me is feeling a growing sense of frustration: though I've had segments of time where I really ought to have been buckling down and committing to finishing something, it feels like my creative juices have all dried up. I like to think of it as Summer Daze Syndrome. And in between the daze, I keep thinking about Nora Roberts in a Q&A session I heard recently, and feeling lame. She said something along the lines of "the Muse is a fickle bitch". Boy do I agree! And I fully realize I shouldn't just be saying "Oh, my creativity isn't feeling up to much". I also realize I need to take to heart her other tidbit of wisdom, that writing is a job and you have to sit down to it every day. It's a habit you have to nuture.

Ahem. Something I most definitely have not been doing.

Also, turns out my attention span is something of a fickle bitch, too--I have three or four story ideas bubbling, any of which I think I could hammer into shape if I could just make up my mind which one to work on.

So, if you're a writer, or have any kind of project you need to get down to, what do you do to get those creative juices going, or to nuture your habit? And if there's more than one project to choose from, how do you pick?