The Ultra Flashblast - Reorganised Weekly With A Prompt!

The Ultra Flashblast will now be organised differently!

Here's what's going to change:

• Once a week a prompt with instructions will be posted.
• Participants will then have a week to post their flash.
• Subsequent posts that week will deal with crits and other things we might learn
• Discussion in the replies is encouraged - the more vigorous the better
• All submissions and crits will be upvoted by laureate

So let's get to the guidelines:

What to do:

• Get your stuff ready; get you environment comfortable, make sure you won't be disturbed for your fixed writing period. Take the phone off the hook if you need to. Log out of discord. Isolate yourself from the world.
• Realise you're doing this for you. Prepare yourself to refuse to allow any non creative thoughts to flourish in your mind. Remind yourself that until you've written many many thousands of words you're unlikely to write something good, and that - as with any discipline, the more you write, the better you'll get.
• Look at the prompt. Then RELAX! Listen to music in the darkness. Meditate. Have a bath. Do whatever it takes for you to calm yourself. Try to let your creative mind think about stories, ideas, words, images. But don't try too hard. Don't force it. Just float.
• At your writing spot pick up your pen and write.
• After a fixed period (from twenty minutes to one hour are good parameters) finish off. Aim for around 500 words. 1000 is a strict maximum
• Take a small amount of time to edit for sense, spelling, comprehension. Not too long though. You're looking for a piece of work heavily influenced by your dream mind.
• Post it below as a reply. It will be critiqued and upvoted, hopefully by more than one person.
• Consider critiquing the work of others. This can be just as instructive.
• Realise that whatever is said about your work, whatever criticisms are received, are not directed at you and are not necessarily right. Learn to separate your ego from your work. This is key to getting better.
• Lastly, realise that this is a new and tricky methodology. Your first attempts will be bad. What we're looking for initially is a twinkle of something shiny amongst the dross of your unconscious. Over time these can be encouraged and better shaped.
• Remember that many writers redraft again and again over months and years. If you don't love what you've written realise that it might contain the germ or seed of something which - in the future - sells to a quality publication.

Here's the first prompt. Interpret it however you wish:

The Sea: