Yes, and I have no idea.
Anything can be a writing prompt. A photo or work of art. A line from a poem. A question. Whatever gets you moving.
I do like this book. More “exercises” than “prompts,” focused on different aspects of writing. 3 AM Epiphany by Brian Kiteley: 9781582973517 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books
This one quote did wonders for me:
“The first draft of anything is shit.”
― Ernest Hemingway
It liberated me from thinking that my first attempt at writing anything has to be good.
Also:
“If it ain’t on the page it ain’t on the stage."
Although I take it out of the context of stage or theatrical (or even film/TV) works are dependent upon a script being written first. My interpretation of it is that any good, worthy, final draft is never going to be arrived at unless there are several crappy previous drafts written. As in, I just get the “stuff” down and worry about prettifying it up later.
One simple way to overcome the fear of doing something is to just do it. Familiarity overcomes fear.
Finally, maybe invent a reason to write, such as writing for therapeutic purposes. Got traumas? Done stupid things in life? Made bad decisions? Put 'em in stories. You’re now connecting “writing” with “fixing” your past. Putting traumas, etc. in fiction (whether intended for publication or not) “objectifies” the old experience. Its now like “it happened to someone else” and perhaps you’re better able to cope with all of that.
One more quote that’s sort of related to the therapy thing. It’s on my avatar:
You’d be surprised at how often I discover what’s in my head and precisely what I think about something when I write about it. It’s hard to explain, except that the process of writing helps sort out whatever is contained in my brain; when I’m done, I’m like “Hey, so that’s what I think about that? Wow, I can actually make sense!”
There’s lots of these. Just do a search for “writing prompts.” Or “writing prompt sites.”
Writing a book is like driving at night. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make a whole trip that way. – E. L. Doctorow.
@anon13690460,
Some things you say suggest you might be experiencing uncontrolled growth of your story ideas. Getting lost in “research” is a frequent sign of this. This needs taming. You are probably letting your ideas grow uncontrollably – until they become so big and complex and (in your mind) so nuanced that you can’t approach them. Most of your talk suggests you are thinking of large-frame writing (novels) and that would no doubt contribute to building only over-large intimidating plans. As many have suggested, write small for this moment.
On the last point: I run a regular writing group which is full of fledgling, would-be, and casual writers. In my experience it helps enormously to give people ways to come up with NEW story ideas in order to get them away from story ideas that they have some personal attachment to (they have been thinking about the idea forever, or it is rooted in some meaningful personal experience, etc.) Because having such attachments almost inevitably gums them up.
You may or may not be inspired by writing prompts you find, but even if not, reading a lot of well-constructed story blurbs will teach you their scale and rhythm and this may help you come up with writing-prompt-sized ideas to pursue.
The rest of this note won't help you at all. Just oversharing:
We often write story prompts just so our folks in the group always have a generous collection to pull from – if they need it to approach something new. We have various strategies for coming up with these. Usually this involves a computer generated pre-prompt. For example I wrote a generator that randomly combines the elements of story according to one taxonomy of “genre” (an embellishment of @pigfender’s taxonomy).
COMING OF AGE • SAVE/FREE THE ‘PRINCESS’ • FANTASY • SAME NATURAL ABILITIES • ANOMALOUS SCI-FI ELEMENT • SOCIETY UNCHANGED • NO UPHEAVAL •
Strangely if you trawl through a few of these they start immediately suggesting story conceits.
When his beloved goldfish is sidelined by the newer, more exotic fish in the aquarium, a lovelorn pet turtle must leave the safety of his tiny island and brave the cavernous expanse of the playroom, in order to free his beloved from her confinement and bring her back to his tiny turtle kingdom.
Another pre-prompt generator I made (and use) does nothing more than fill in a grammatical pattern with randomly chosen words of the right grammatical types. For example,
extra pie, strict asking. completely failed. competing really. [whose, throughout].
Which inspired the following story prompt:
The usual playful vying for best dessert between these two takes an unexpected turn when one of their desserts inexplicably ends up on the floor.
Best wishes.
GR
3 AM Epiphany is really good. Highly recommend it.
I have a whole series of articles on collections. You can use search on the site to find more.
How did you feel when you wrote your first story at the age of 14?
Eight-year-old Picasso. I don’t know if he liked it, what his parents said or what his art teacher thought. I know that he didn’t stop there.
@November_Sierra // I’ve actually considered writing a story about a topic or in a genre that I’m not particularly comfortable with, just for practice and to get into the habit of writing. I think writing prompts would be ideal because that way I might be able to find topics to write about, regardless of whether they interest me or not. 
@kewms // I looked at the paintings and think they are really well done. When it comes to books, it sometimes seems like a mammoth task to rewrite, organize, and refine a novel over and over again. Of course, it’s achievable, but at first glance it seems overwhelming. I always try to remind myself that you read a book piece by piece and, in most cases, not all at once.
I found a great site for writing prompts: Reedsy Creative Writing Prompts
Great quote. Maybe a longer story will emerge from several 250-word writing sessions. 
@paulcoholic // The second quote is spot on, reflecting what I often think: an idea in my head is good, but it would be worth more if it were written down. Many of my current ideas are inspired by past experiences, and in some cases I actually hope to give back to the world through my stories what I value so much in books: new ways of thinking and perspectives, exploring (foreign) worlds, and simply taking a break from all the everyday stress that we experience or that we make for ourselves. At the end of the day, I want to tell stories, and to do that, I have to admit that the first time I tell a story, it will have gaps and logical errors, especially the longer it gets. But with each new telling (i.e., revision), it will (hopefully) become a great story. 
@gr // When I read your post, I thought it would be great to combine it with the one-inch picture frame trick and then with @AmberV’s 250-word method. Now I have a proper method for getting into writing without thinking too much about the story or the how or being overwhelmed by the sheer amount of work involved.
@GoalieDad // Wow, great job. This site is at least as helpful as Helping Writers Become Authors. You seem to live and breathe Scrivener. 
@SCN // Haha, is this a free therapy session? 
Marathons and sprints are both hard, but they’re hard in different ways.
If you can write 1000 words, you can write a novel. Just write 1000 words 60-80 times. Which is kind of a glib way to put it: yes, I know that novels are structurally different from short stories. But to write 80,000 words, you first have to write 1,000, then 5,000, then 10,000 and so on.
In my case, I’m first trying to write 50 times 1000 words. It would be a very slim novel, but at least it would be a novel. 
I don’t know why, but sometimes I feel that short stories are more difficult to write than novels.
Sounds good. As long as you don’t walk into the “research” trap (I mean in an unhealthy way that keeps you from actually writing).
Our bill is in the mail. 
Thanks for this!
I have this Stephen King quote on my wall: “The scariest moment is always just before you start. After that, things can only get better.” Just seeing this instantly evaporates all my dawdling. Instantly.
There’s something about anticipating starting on The Project (in Germanic-Gothic font) that really revs up that scaredy-cat part of the brain. Sheesh. Once I do twiddle my way in, 99% of the time the trickle (sometimes flow) of ideas starts.
Tricking myself in some way helps: writing in bullet points. Writing on cheap, tossable paper. Literally making a list of objects in a painting (this has helped a few times!). Freewriting questions.
Thanks for helping me pro-…–prime the brain. Off to do some bullet-point writing. 
In solidarity.
lots of terrible advice in this thread. some good advice too. the trouble is, only you will be able to tell which of it is good and which of it is terrible for you.
in my experience, if it,s genuinely ,perfectionism, that,s causing your paralysis, then following advice to switch off your inner editor and just write is good in theory but impossible in practice.
write as well as you can each and every time you write, just don,t trade progress for polish on a first draft.
speaking of first drafts, remember that there will be a second, and possibly a third.
don,t waste time on a fourth… just move on.
always write your current best idea. you,ll have other great ideas when you need them.
if you,ve not written much before… start small. gradually get bigger. lots of small finished work will teach you more than one large unfinished piece.
don,t listen to anyone else on how to write… become your own advisor. if you have a productive session, replicate that process. if you have an unproductive week, that’s not your process.
