Coming up with inspiration to write articles, essays, stories - whatever it is one writes about - can be impossibly hard. Sometimes, the best thing to do is to just lock yourself in a room and tell yourself that you are not coming out "until you have something to write." More extreme measures involve self-mutilation and food depravation, but I have never been that starved for ideas.

I like to consider myself a sort of writing connoisseur in the sense that I like writing about many different things in a number of different formats. It certainly makes the entire process more exciting rather than writing the benefits of owning a particular kind of dog every single day (which I've done in the past). That may work for some, but I need variety to be successful. However, there is this looming distraction that hangs over me that is just about impossible to avoid nowadays. It calls to me repeatedly while I am writing and I just cannot find the willpower to pass it up. If I hit a rut and find myself not writing anything for more than a few seconds, I turn to my best friend and my greatest enemy: the internet.

I like to think that every writer has some sort of beef with the internet and all of its little intricacies that we like to enjoy when we are bored or simply out of ideas. After all, I use the internet to gather a lot of the topics I talk about. It's just that once I start writing the final product, I can get stuck, like any other writer. Then I turn to the internet - check my e-mail, to play a game, check the score of the game, check my e-mail, read the news, and check my e-mail (I love checking my e-mail; new messages in my inbox literally make my week). Once I start doing that, wandering far off my intended course, I find it incredibly difficult to get back on track and finish whatever it was I was working on.

This dilemma does not matter so much when I am writing a piece of fiction or something that I am not counting on to make me some varying degree of money. Time becomes a hideous, flesh-eating beast when I am writing on deadlines, and the internet is its little accomplice, purposely throwing me off so I don't finish as much as I would have liked.

For all of the writers out there who experience this problem (by the way, have you ever checked out Dolphin Cup on addictinggames.com? It's absolutely blissful - and, well, addicting), I offer one piece of advice: stop typing on the computer until you absolutely have to. One of the best things a writer can do is simply sit down with a notebook and start jotting down ideas. Even as I am writing this, I clicked onto my web browser out of sheer instinct. I am starting to feel that something has taken over my mind, always forcing me to check my inbox just one more time.

Anyway, writers who experience this terribly debilitating problem need to sit down in a quiet, empty room with a notebook, which I alluded to before I was distracted by the very subject of this article. Even without being distracted by the internet, it is a good idea to use a notebook to write down ideas because you will never forget them. Anything that comes to mind, write it down. New ideas can stem from those, including longer and potentially higher-paying articles. Flesh out what you want to write - maybe write out a rough draft - and then go to the computer. You will not be as tempted to go on the internet when you know exactly what it is that you want to write.

Keeping clear of distractions, especially those of the electronic variety, is a key to utilizing your time wisely and writing quality articles. If you have specific production goals that you are not meeting, try getting off the computer; it really helps. The internet isn't the worst thing to happen to humanity, but it can sometimes be the most annoying. For now, it remains a frustrating fly buzzing around the world's head, but who knows what will happen when computers finally take over and the internet can convince a person to pillage and kill without mercy? Keep control of your minds, people!