November — and with it, NaNoWriMo — might be drawing to a close, but fiction writers don’t stop telling stories just because another page is torn from the calendar. And whatever the season, slapping sentences into a compelling narrative is never easy.

We’ve all heard the common axioms recited to writers everywhere: “Write everyday!” “Show, don’t tell!” “Write about what you know!” Sometimes, though, it’s a good idea to try something different to get the creative juices flowing in new directions. Here are five writing tips that might sound counterintuitive at first, but could potentially help you cross a word-count threshold, smash through a writer’s block, or just come up with a new story idea.