How to write lyrics without inspiration

If you are a songwriter, you’ve probably had the experience many times: staring at a blank page, not knowing what to write about, and not knowing where to start. It’s not that we don’t want to write anything, we just don’t have any inspiration. So how do we actually write lyrics without having any “natural” inspiration?

We often expect ourselves to immediately write down some wonderful song lyrics. But this is a huge burden that is actually holding us back. Try writing down an experience, story, or dream first, this gives you a starting point from where your inspiration can flow.

In the video below you can see a short excerpt of an Ed Sheeran interview where he compares writing songs with dirty water flowing out of a tap. A lot of the dirty water needs to come out first before it can provide some clean water.

Your creativity needs to start flowing

So one way how you can start up this creative momentum is by sitting down in front of a piece of paper and just start writing about anything. For me personally, I love to write down the dreams I’ve had that very night. They are often very interesting and give me a lot of original ideas.

So once you’ve written down something on a piece of paper, you are now more in a “writing” kind of mental state. How do you like your story? Is it interesting or fun to you? If not, try again with a different subject or try to write down an experience you’ve had in the past from memory. How clearly can you put all of the details on the paper?

The idea is to fall in love with a particular story, a certain character, a dream, or an idea. How can you make it more interesting? Use your imagination.

When is the best time to write

This writing down of my dreams is something I do in the morning. It is actually my version of Julia Camerons “The Morning Pages”. If you are not familiar with her book The Artists Way, I highly recommend you buy her book. It changed my life.

The reason why writing in the morning is the best time to write is because you are still close to a different world: the world you were in when you were still sleeping. Early in the morning, you are still slowly transitioning from that world to our real, harsh confrontational world. So capture those hints that your subconscious is giving you when you are still “in-between worlds”.

“The idea is to fall in love with a particular story, a certain character, a dream, or an idea.”

The difference between internal and external lines

Internal lines are usually lines that are describing how a person is feeling in the song, and external lines are more describing physical things. Internal lines are more about thoughts, feelings, desires, or more abstract concepts like: “I felt like an idiot” (internal). External lines describe things more of the material world like “When I bumped my toe against the closet” (external).

So just like playing with stable and unstable notes when writing an interesting melody, we need to use both internal and external lines to create a good lyric to lure the listener into the world of the song. On average the verse of a song tends to be more on the external side, and its chorus tends to be more on the internal side. But the idea is to use both internal and external throughout the song.

What is “meter”, and how do I use it?

The words that we write our lyrics with are made up of syllables. Some syllables are what we call “stressed”, and we emphasise that part of the word. For example, let’s use the children’s song “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes.”

Musically, you can see that all of the weak syllables are placed on the “ands” of each beat and the stressed syllables are placed precisely on the beat. This isn’t a rule that is set in stone or anything. You can of course diverge from this but it works like a charm.

Do I have to use rhyme in my lyrics?

Yes, rhyming is unique to poetry and lyric-writing, so let’s use it in our songs! But wait… There is a catch. When people start writing their first songs, they enthusiastically start rhyming all over the place and before they know it there rhymes will start to feel a little bit forced.

If you can’t find the perfect rhyme word for “orange”, well don’t look any further, because that is really hard. What you can do, however, is to find near rhymes. For instance, the word “alright” doesn’t seem to rhyme that much at first glance.

But they do have some commonalities: firstly, both words are 2 syllables long and in both words, the second one starts with an r. Secondly, both words start with somewhat of the same vowel. When you pronounce “Al” in the word alright, it sounds very similar to the “O” in orange.

And if you can’t find any near rhymes, then don’t rhyme at all! Not rhyming is often better than using words that are not your own. Always stick as close as possible to the original story that you’ve written down when you first started out. That is your natural way of speaking, and that vocabulary should be used most in your lyrics in order to make it feel genuine.

“Don’t lose sight of the bigger picture.”

The importance of taking breaks

The painting above is “The Night Watch” by the famous Dutch painter Rembrandt. The canvas is huge (363 cm × 437 cm (11.91 ft × 14.34 ft). In order to paint this masterpiece, the painter was forced to constantly step away from his work to see the bigger picture.

I wanted to use this as a metaphor for using breaks as our time of stepping away from our lyrics. When you take a break and do something completely else, like taking a shower, going for a walk, doing the dishes, your brain is still processing everything on a backburner.

The craziest ideas or solutions to your songwriting problems will come to you often when you are doing something completely different. For me, this is often when I’m physically moving, like walking or going to the gym. It’s as if getting my body into a flow is also getting my creativity to flow better.

My personal opinion

My personal experience is that the more you do it, the easier and the more often ideas will come to you. But as soon as you stop sitting at that paper every once in a while, the creativity seems to stop as well. So that means you’ve got to get in the reps and write those stories, dreams, experiences even when you are not inspired.

Starting a sentence can often kickstart the inspiration for a new one, and then you will write another one, and another one… And if it really doesn’t work anymore, take a break, and try again the next morning. At the end of the tunnel, there is going to be a song. I guarantee it.

Conclusion

You don’t always need inspiration to begin writing. Just write something from your experience first. It doesn’t immediately have to be song lyrics. Something like a dream can be really inspiring.

The important thing is to start the creative process and let it flow. Play with internal versus external lines, and use a meter to your advantage to make your lyrics flow most naturally. If you want to use rhyme, that’s okay, but never use it in a forced way. It will only make your lyrics sound less genuine.

And lastly, never lose sight of the bigger picture. Working hard on your lyrics is good, but stepping away from it can give the idea of more “marinading time” in your subconscious mind to develop.

How to write lyrics without inspiration

How to write lyrics without inspiration

Your creativity needs to start flowing

When is the best time to write

The difference between internal and external lines

What is “meter”, and how do I use it?

Do I have to use rhyme in my lyrics?

The importance of taking breaks

My personal opinion

Conclusion

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