Writing Tip Number 1: Give away your best stuff. Improv Tenet: Go into the cave.

Go Into The Cave, also called Follow the Fear, means, as an improviser, don’t play safe. If you feel the scene is veering into scary territory—a deep dark cave—go there.

As practitioners, the fear lurking inside that deep dark cave is the risk of someone else taking your ideas and doing something amazing with them without crediting you. This is a valid fear. And I would argue that the benefits outweigh that risk. Giving away your best stuff does the following:

• Adds to the greater conversation about this field.
• Makes you look secure, credible, courageous.
• We have had such great reactions to this aspect of our book Applied Improvisation, making it practical and authoritative.
• And finally… our ideas were fully never ours anyway! We constantly inspire and are inspired by others.

Give away your best stuff. Improv Tenet: Go into the cave.

What are you going to write about?