Paid $45 for a writing prompt deck at a garage sale in Reno and it fixed my worst habit

Wesley Gonzalez · 2026-09-12T14:40:03.815988+00:00

I write short stories on my lunch break, mostly weird stuff about people stuck in boring jobs, and I kept starting every single one the same way (you know, weather, then someone walking into a room). Six months ago I stopped at a garage sale in Reno and this lady was selling a beat up deck of cards for $45. It was some old writing prompt deck, maybe from the 90s, with a different prompt on each card. I almost walked away because who pays $45 for cards, but my gut said grab it. Turns out the rule on the box was simple: pull one card, write for ten minutes, no going back to fix anything. That one rule killed my habit of rewriting the first line forty times. I've finished 22 stories since then, more than the whole year before. The trick is a prompt forces you to start in the middle of something instead of warming up. Has anyone else paid real money for a physical prompt tool and actually stuck with it, or did it end up in a drawer?

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Paid $45 for a writing prompt deck at a garage sale in Reno and it fixed my worst habit | Creative Writing Prompts - Guest Forum