I’ve decided to tackle a problem that seems to plague every
writer at some point or another. That’s right today I will be discussing the
terror known as writer’s block.
I’ve battled on and off with writers block ever since I
started writing. My first real experience with it was in middle school when
after a writing club meeting I was assigned the task of writing a piece of
short fiction dealing with advertising. I thought and thought on what I was
going to do and came up empty each time. I was hit with the double whammy of
blank page syndrome and writer’s block all at once and I couldn’t figure out
where to go.
Some of you may have experienced this awful feeling of
wanting desperately to put something down on the page and not being able to.
Others may be well into their work and have simply ground to a halt (or maybe
come screaming to a stop) but almost any serious writer has come across it. Everyone
says something different about writer’s block and curing it and I even came up
with a miracle cure of my own back in middle school while wrestling with my
short story. I finally hammered out the story of a sad author stuck deep in the
mires of writer’s block who conveniently tunes into a commercial for a miracle
drink known as Block-B-Gone the revolutionary cure for writers block.
If only curing writer’s block could be as easy as taking a
swig of good old Block-B-Gone.
Over the years as I’ve struggled with writer’s block I’ve
come across a lot of different advice, some of it worked and some of it didn’t.
I’m going to give you my top ten list of ‘Block-B-Gone’ cures that have helped
me to get past some of my toughest bouts with writers block. I’ve used all of
these at least once and some of them on a regular basis just to keep my writing
on track. I hope at least one of them can help you.
Block-B-Gone
Ten ways to get rid of Writer’s Block:
10: Just keep on writing past the block. It doesn’t matter
what you are writing, just make sure you are writing. Even if you’ve moved away
from your novel, poem, or whatever as long as you keep plowing forward
eventually you’ll break through.
9: When writer’s block sets in step away from your desk,
notebook, ect. and do something else for a while.
8: Do a writing exercise or find some prompts. These can
both help you get started or keep moving in your writing. There are a lot of
them out there and they can be a great way to generate ideas.
7: This goes with number 9, get some exercise. Getting your
body moving helps to shake away all the mess and clear the way for great ideas,
just make sure you’ve got a notebook on hand for when that idea finally does
strike.
6: Set it aside for a few days and then come back to it and
read it over again.
5: Ideas will hit you at the most unexpected of times so
keep a notebook ready for when they do. You never know what mundane event in
your life will spark the breakthrough you’ve been waiting for in your novel.
4: The best way is always to stop when you are going good
and when you know what will happen next. If you do that every day … you will
never be stuck.
3: Ignore your inner critic. We are often the hardest on ourselves
and this can often halt our writing process if we are not careful. I have often
talked myself out of writing something for fear of how it would look or turn
out.
2: Have fun. Albert Einstein once said “Creativity is
intelligence having fun.” And I’ve found this to be true. I started writing
because it was fun. I’ve always enjoyed telling stories or making them up with
friends and we were always at our best when we were having fun. The two just go
together.
1: When you are stuck that is your subconscious trying to
tell you that you have gone in a wrong direction. Step back and look at what
you’ve written and don’t be afraid to rewrite whole sections of your work. I
got this advice when I was seriously stuck on a chapter in my novel and I ended
up having to rewrite over a chapter and a half because of it. However the
rewrite changed the story back into a direction I liked and things are flowing
very well now.
My personal favorite cures on this list are cures #1 and 2
(that’s probably the reason there at the top of my list…). They tend to go best
together for me. As long as I’m having fun and the story is flowing in the
right direction writer’s block seems to stay far away. It’s only when I let it
become work or try to think too hard about the story that things get messy.
I understand writing is hard, but so is everything that is
worthwhile in life. Don’t let the block get you down, try some of these ‘cures’
and if they don’t work and you still need help there are plenty more on the
internet to try. My advice? Use what works for you. You know yourself and your
writing best, so stick to the things that tend to work for you and you’ll do
fine.
~Dawn
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