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Hey look! An entry that isn't about religion! Amazing!
For about a year I have not written stories on my own, which before I quite enjoyed. Last year, in fact, I had gotten up to a little over 50 pages in a story, but then I realized that I didn't really like several points in it, and simply couldn't find the inspiration to go back and completely re-write it, and since then I've mostly just been reading, playing games, and doing homework. I thought that perhaps I was just no longer interested, or too distracted, since the urge to write had fled almost completely; I even stopped writing in my diary regularly, or writing poetry.

It depressed me to no end, but I tried to ignore it. (That's how I generally deal with feelings I don't like, I'm slightly ashamed to say.) But last weekend a story I had been thinking about for awhile (I never stopped making up stories- just lost the urge to write. Hell, even my DREAMS have storylines) suddenly coalesced when I read something about killing off characters, and I abruptly switched the original main character to a quick death scene in the very beginning of the book and went to a different character. Suddenly I couldn't wait to get started; in fact, I got out of bed right then and there and got some paper.
I believe I realize now why I had such trouble- the storylines weren't interesting enough- there was too much of a sameness about them. Not that the stories THEMSELVES were actually all that similar, but the feel WAS. The main characters were generally all of the same type- you know, kind of the strong silent type, mysterious, kind, self-sacrificing... those kinds of characters are easy for me, since they are rather similar to me, and I was kind of afraid to try and do someone different because I was afraid I couldn't do it, wouldn’t be able to get into their heads. With the story I created (the one I'm doing now) the originally main character (her name is now Elena) was really nothing new for me, but I was thinking about doing different personalities, and started creating what was originally going to be a very minor character, Reen, in an attempt to kind of clash with Elena, but as I tried to create a personality close to opposite of hers, I quickly grew fascinated by it, and Reen became more and more major, until Elena was, in fact, becoming overshadowed slightly, and when I read about killing off characters, I knew what to do: kill Elena, and create in Reen a totally new perspective for me. In fact now that I have started writing, I believe that the break was a good thing, and that creativity and detail has become much more important to me; that my writing has, in a sense had time to evolve, and will now be better put to use.