Writer's block

pickarooney

Over a month since I managed a complete sentence, and that was muck. Has anyone any tips for getting over a crippling fear of writing? I've tried everything I can think of so far but I just freeze up and get a sort of instant depression every time I try to write something. The main problem is I don't know what to write, but I reckon if I could get anything at all down it would help me get a move on.

Princessdizzy

I hope I'm not going to suggest stuff you've already tried but there are some 'exercises' I've picked up during a writing course. One that always sticks in my mind is to write about 'scene through a window' (or 'seen through a window'). Loads of ways that could go - you could be looking OUT of the window to countryside, people, waiting for someone or you could be looking IN the window - my favourite idea looking into an old-fashioned toy/antique shop window. Perhaps if you start a few of those something will come.

Flicking through my Writing magazine there's an exercise starting from the end line. It says write this at the bottom of the page 'Probably this would be the best time to go'. Then above it write a preceding line. It says no planning, just invent freely, each line up the page. Just a bit of fun to get writing really.

Oh and another one, take a headline from a paper (but ignore the real story) and make up a story from it.

pickarooney

I made a small bit of progress this morning. I should start taking long baths or something, I seem to get any inspiration I manage in the bathroom!

I still can't figure out where to start chopping though.

EileenG

I don't believe in writer's block. In all the years I've worked as a journalist, I never once failed to turn in a story because I had writer's block. Some of the stories I turned in were pretty crappy, but they all contained the necessary numbers of words on the page, and with a bit of ruthless editing, they were all publishable.

I do believe in "Writer's Don't Want to". There are lots of times I really don't want to sit down and write, and only having a deadline got my bum on the seat. When you are writing fiction, you usually don't have that sort of immediate deadline forcing your bum on the seat, so it's easy to put it off.

I'll bet good money that you are writing e-mails, posts on Boards, all sorts of other stuff. You can write. It's just a matter of sitting down and writing something for yourself. It doesn't have to be good, it just has to be on the page or screen.

pickarooney

Yeah, that's pretty much what I understood as Writer's Block. It's not a physical impairment, just an absence of inspiration. It definitely does have to be good though, which is the biggest part of the problem.

H. Flashman

pickarooney wrote: »

Over a month since I managed a complete sentence, and that was muck. Has anyone any tips for getting over a crippling fear of writing? I've tried everything I can think of so far but I just freeze up and get a sort of instant depression every time I try to write something. The main problem is I don't know what to write, but I reckon if I could get anything at all down it would help me get a move on.

I think writers block is mainly down to lack of motivation. If you really want to write sit down and force youself to write the first thing that comes into your head, don't worry if its any good or not that will eventually come. Also if your having trouble with a particular chapter or whatever try skipping past it to the next chapter or even a random chapter miles ahead and come back to the troublesome chapter later. Try to think up single sentences that sum up a particular paragraph/plotpoint/chapter/viewpoint and then try to expand a logical conversation or series of events around it.

Read books lots of books

nervous_twitch

EileenG wrote: »

I don't believe in writer's block. In all the years I've worked as a journalist, I never once failed to turn in a story because I had writer's block. Some of the stories I turned in were pretty crappy, but they all contained the necessary numbers of words on the page, and with a bit of ruthless editing, they were all publishable.

I do believe in "Writer's Don't Want to". There are lots of times I really don't want to sit down and write, and only having a deadline got my bum on the seat. When you are writing fiction, you usually don't have that sort of immediate deadline forcing your bum on the seat, so it's easy to put it off.

I'll bet good money that you are writing e-mails, posts on Boards, all sorts of other stuff.

I would be inclined to disagree, EileenG.

Block is about much more than just being physically able to write. I could sit down and write 5000 words tomorrow if I felt like it, but I can almost guarantee that I wouldn't be happy with anything I'd produced. For me, writers block is about not feeling like you have anything to say; or rather, not knowing what it is you want to say. Ultimately, its about a lack of inspiration.

It could be different for everyone, but its definitely nothing to do with "not wanting to", as you say. Countless times I've started writing and deleted everything I've just done because I wasnt satisfied with it.

EileenG wrote: »

It's just a matter of sitting down and writing something for yourself. It doesn't have to be good, it just has to be on the page or screen.

I do agree with this though. I think writers who experience block can be too perfectionist, and exert too much pressure on themselves to come up with something brilliant - sometimes you just have to write for the sake of it. I read a relevant quote recently, 'When you're not concerned with succeeding, you can work with great freedom.' Obviously when your aim is to get published, this can be difficult, but you need to get back into the habit of writing just for enjoyments sake. Even 400/500 words a night about anything will stimulate your creativity.

Don't wait to get inspired. Just start. Be entirely mechanical about it, and in the course of writing you should discover where it is you want to go.

Otherwise, psychedelics should do the trick

EileenG

It's a bit like going to the gym. Some workouts are just a slog, and you wonder why you do it to yourself. But even those slogs teach you something, and pave the way for the killer workouts. Waiting for inspiration usually means writing nothing at all.

cobsie

Here's my two cents: Don't worry about writing anything down -why not just think about it for a while? Thinking is also part of writing. You need to give your mind some space to come up with something unexpected.

Turn things over in your mind, trust your imagination, your instinct. Ideas will come and go but the ones that are worth pursuing will stick. You will see connections and the possibilities between disparate ideas and the instinct to shape a narrative will take over and then you'll have something to start writing about.

We're lucky enough to pursue an endeavor where daydreaming counts as research

Memnoch

One question.

"It definitely does have to be good though, which is the biggest part of the problem."

Why?

pickarooney

Memnoch wrote: »

One question.

"It definitely does have to be good though, which is the biggest part of the problem."

Why?

Well, there's no point replacing a bad part of a story with something worse.

Memnoch

Okay, that makes sense if you're re-writing.

Have you finished a full draft? If you haven't, then just start working on the next chapter that you need to write. If you have and are feeling stuck during re-writing like you HAVE to write something good then I would strongly suggest working on something new for a few days or even a week or two.

I get writer's block also, and the longer I leave it, the worse it gets. The building fear and apprehension and doubt of how you won't be able to write and if/when you do it will be utterly rubbish and pointless and so on and so forth. But usually once I start writing and force myself past the first few hundred words the story begins to flow again and I have to remind myself of this all the time, though I still go through barren patches a lot.

The key is to write stuff that you want to write and write it for yourself, forget about getting published or making a career as a fiction writer or anything. Just think of the story you want to tell, think of WHY you want to tell it and then write.

As I said above, if your stuck at the rewrite stage, write something else to freshen yourself and get the imagination going again till the confidence builds back up, when it does you'll find the inspiration will hit you or the idea to fix what needs to be fixed will come along.

Reading helps to inspire me also.

Good luck!

MarkfromMann

Personally I find it best to have lots of different bits on the go at anyone time. When I am uninspired or stuck, I simply just read one of the many scripts/books/poems or whatever it is I come across that is unfinished and I normally find something that sparks an idea, and before I know it, a poem or chapter that had been unfinished for the last six months suddenly becomes complete, or at the very least, taken a little bit further.
When I am really stuck... I literally just begin a whole new poem or book or chapter, just to get the writing flowing. I think someone earlier suggested looking at headlines. Fim titles/song titles can give inspiration for a poem or short story, even a book. If you are concentrating on just the one book, why not write little short stories about the characters in your novel... something completely different to what your wirting about, just to let your mind drift.... who knows, you might actually think of something you can then include in your novel...

By having lots and lots of things on the go and uncomplete, you will always find something that triggers a response...

Memnoch

That doesn't really work for me personally. I can't multi-task at all but it sounds like a good idea.

pickarooney

MarkfromMann wrote: »

why not write little short stories about the characters in your novel... something completely different to what your wirting about, just to let your mind drift.... who knows, you might actually think of something you can then include in your novel...

By having lots and lots of things on the go and uncomplete, you will always find something that triggers a response...

That sounds like a really good idea. One of the problems I'm having (7th rewrite) is stretching out a character to fill a void left by removing a few chapers and characters. I have ideas in my head of his whole (unincluded) backstory but nothing actually written.

EileenG

Sometimes when you are doing rewrites and getting stuck, I find it's easiest to go to a different computer or program, and rewrite the whole scene from scratch. It's often easier to do it that way than to try to fix bits here and there.

Memnoch

Agree with Eileen. If you're finding it difficult to fit a new character into the story, and it's feeling tacked on, that's probably because you didn't have this character in mind while writing the rest of it. Which can make a big difference.

Do you really need to "fill the whole?" Is it a word count thing? Does your story really need this extra character?

Thinking about it a bit more, I'm not to keen on having a lot of projects going on at once. That way you will always run away from stuff that seems difficult or challenging rather than force yourself to plow through it (which can be the only way sometimes or you could be waiting months for inspiration to strike).

It's fine when you're talking about shorter stuff like poems or short stories, but to finish a novel you have to write even when you don't want to. Besides, you don't want to fall out of sync with the voice of the story in a novel, which I think would be a danger if you were jumping around, unless the voice is the same everywhere. I'm mostly speculating here, since I tend to focus on one project at a time.

But I have heard other writers say that you can have one re-write project and one new project without too much hassle. Different quills and all.

MarkfromMann

Memnoch has hit the nail on the head there to be fair, with regards to having other work on the go simultaneously. It is very easy to become distracted from a piece of work you were working on, and I am terrible for doing it... but atleast the distraction is productive. But I do get your point... its like flicking through TV channels during commericals, and before too long you cant remember what channel you were actually watching originally.

It is nice to occasionally come across something that you had completely forgotten about though. Its like finding a tenner in an old pair of jeans you are about to throw out!! Ha!!!

pickarooney

Memnoch wrote: »

Agree with Eileen. If you're finding it difficult to fit a new character into the story, and it's feeling tacked on, that's probably because you didn't have this character in mind while writing the rest of it. Which can make a big difference.

Do you really need to "fill the whole?" Is it a word count thing? Does your story really need this extra character?

By removing a couple of characters, some plot-vital interactions they had with another character now need to be picked up by someone else or the story won't make sense. The character in question is himself vital to the plot but had had a fairly minor presence previously. It's really hard to explain this semi-hypothetically!

EileenG

I understand the problem. I changed one character from driving a car to a jeep, and I couldn't believe how often this caused problems all through the book. Changing a character is a big deal, but sometimes less is more.

cobsie

Yeah, it's amazingly hard to undo the actions of a character, invisible though they may be...

did I read something about a 7th rewrite, though? That just seems a bit grim, to me...if it was a friend trying to fix a relationship, I'd be tempted to lay a hand on a shoulder and say, you know what? this is never going to work. Learn what you can and move on...

Memnoch

It depends on if it's a total re-write or simply an editing pass which a lot of us still call 're-writes.'

But yeah, if the entire thing has been re-written from start to finish 7 times I would have to say that cobsie's post is harsh but probably on the money.

pickarooney

I don't know at what stage you distinguish between editing and re-writing but the file name has _Version7.1 at the end