Collaborative Descriptions, page 1

Here's the idea:

The point of writing is to make the reader feel whatever you're describing. So, for instance, the idea of pain has many possibilities.

The pain of heartbreak.
The pain of a heart attack.
The pain of getting ink.
The pain of breaking a limb.
Et cetera...

All are physical sensations; however, each version of pain is different than the rest. A heart attack feels different than breaking a leg, a piercing different than a bee sting.

So, *how* are they different?
How can we describe them so that the sensations are truly separate from each other and not under the blanket 'painful' term?

My proposal is for us writers to come together and just describe different feelings/sensations. Maybe not just pain, as there are most certainly many different feelings/sensations, but 'pain' is such a general term that it fits...

For example: One of my characters has a heart attack. But I have never had one, nor will my grandfather (the only person I know who's had one) describe it in terms that I can use. ('Heart in a vice' is the typical. But, that does not suffice for me...) So I wrote what I could come up with based on a little research, but I don't think it's 'good enough'.

This is not to say that we should out-and-out steal people's descriptions.
The point is to come up with a sizeable basis of descriptions from which to get ideas and pull details.

Good idea or no?