I write fiction, but in recent times have been running into an issue where I get into the middle of a story and get ... bored by it. I'm just grinding it out to finish it in some plausible way, but whatever interested me enough to prompt starting it has gone.
I don't necessarily write fiction1 but I think I know this feeling.
So in the past ... week and a half, I've been doing this new thing, which an observer or a camera wouldn't notice, but when I'm in the middle of one of these slogs, I clear my mind and ask myself: what is interesting about what's going on in this story? Even if it's not in the story, but an implication, something happening off-stage, a random character I made up and referred to in passing, or even just something about where my mind wants to go. Is there any destination, given where things are, that I could orient to?
Sounds like you're building a universe! And your stories are glimpses into that universe.
I initially thought that what I am doing is different (since it's not fiction), but when I view it from this angle (building a universe) it might be quite similar: When I notice I don't want to write about a topic anymore (even though I still feel like I am a one-trick pony which just delivers the same message in different packages), this usually means that I want to write about a completely different topic now. I then try to connect these two stories in some way since both are about topics that interest me. So this means that I am the connection and I am kind of building my own universe.
This also gives me the feeling of having a never ending source of ideas since hopefully, there will always be something that interests me, lol.
Might be the same for you and your universe! Always more to tell. The art is to know how to deliver it :)
So far, two stories in with this method, it's helped. There has been, so far, a distant sound that I could start heading to, and then it's okay. Then I can keep going.
Footnotes