How to Blast Past “Writer’s Block” in Minutes
Today we're talking about how to blast past writer's block in just minutes. Writer's block is something that can strike all of us at one point or another, no matter how many ideas you have or how experienced a writer you are.
The good news is that there are a number of simple techniques you can use to get past it quickly and easily. So let's take a look at some of my favorite techniques.
Tip #1: Entertain yourself while you write
The first tip for getting past writer's block is to entertain yourself while you write. Try having fun. What entertains you? What do you enjoy?
You, not some imaginary reader from the future or the internal voice of your sophomore year english professor. If you're stuck, try this. Set aside your 900 page novel you've been working on or your thesis or your blog post, or whatever it is that's giving you trouble.
What do you think sounds really fun to write right now? Maybe it's a poem and you're not a poet, but who cares? Maybe it's a McSweeney's List and you think, oh, but I'm not funny. Well, maybe you are today. Or that story about the time you got stuck in the bathroom, or were on an airplane with Britney Spears, whatever it is, write that.
What sounds fun for you to write right now? Because when we're having trouble writing and we have writer's block, instead of trying to go from zero to 60, to go from being stuck to suddenly freely and happily writing chapter 17 of your epic saga, let's try to go from zero to three—from being stuck to just writing something.
And the way we're going to get ourselves to just writing something, and having a good time doing it, is to rediscover the pleasure of it and see where that leads. And that means writing whatever you feel like writing, no matter if it's ever going to get published or not.
And hey, you might surprise yourself. It might be the best thing you've ever written.
Tip #2: Try a writing prompt
The second tip is to try a writing prompt, and I'm not really talking about those kind of writing prompts that make you feel like you're back in the seventh grade—like someone drops a mystery box on your front doorstep. What's in it?
I mean more like invest some time and think of prompts that are interesting to you and give you the freedom to just write whatever comes to mind. I even like to use them to generate passages for whatever project I'm currently working on.
What you write in response to a writing prompt doesn't have to be something you throw away or a mere exercise. One that I really love is asking myself, what secret is this character keeping? What are they doing to keep it? What are they afraid will happen if it gets out? And then you can even expand on that. Do other characters know about this secret? What did they think of it?
I find a lot of times that prompts around secrets generate some of my favorite writing. But whether it's a prompt about a secret or not, you can come up with some of your own writing prompts.
One of my writers told me this week that she decided she was going to write a list of interview questions for each of her characters, the kind of things that someone might ask on a first date, and she found it was a really fun exercise. I want to be clear that that's not something you have to do. I don't think you need to interview your characters before you start writing a novel. But I do think it can be a really good way of kicking yourself out of writer's block.
Tip #3: Tweak your environment
The third tip is to tweak your surrounding environment. Question for you: Do you like your writing space? Do you like where you sit when you are writing?
You should enjoy your writing space. And it's not just about the space. In the same way that adjusting one piece of furniture can have a rippling effect and can cause you to re-envision an entire room, a simple physical change in your writing practice can jostle you out of writer's block.
I keep a stack of different colored pens next to me and I swap them out whenever I feel like it, even if it's mid sentence. Sometimes I can get out of a blockage just by switching from pink to blue. I get a fresh idea.
So change it up. Whether it's your space and you need to find a fresher space that makes you feel good, or it's just getting some colorful pens or a new notebook, sometimes a simple physical change in your surroundings can make a difference in how you're approaching your writing.
Tip #4: Figure out the deeper fear behind your block
The fourth tip is going to get psychological. Figure out the deeper fear that's paralyzing you. What's the greatest enemy of a writer in one word? Resistance.
Resistance is the inevitable pushback from the universe whenever we try to create something new. The term was coined by writer Stephen Pressfield in his really great book called, The War of Art. If you haven't read it, I recommend checking it out. You can probably read it in just an hour or two.
The idea is that whenever you try to create something new, you're going to face resistance. The good thing about this is that resistance is one hundred percent in our heads, which means we can overcome it with the right kind of mindset shifts. If you can't write, there's probably something else subconsciously stopping you.
So what is it? Ask yourself what else might be going on. Maybe journal a bit about it. Is it fear that your writing is not good enough? Is it fear that your writing will hurt your friends and family, say if you're writing from experience or basing your story on real things that have happened? Is it fear that your writing won't match the vision you have in your head, that you'll let yourself down?
Whatever it is, once you give a name to what's troubling you, it becomes so much easier to tackle. In fact, sometimes once you give a name to what's troubling you, it just sort of loses its power.
I still feel resistance and I've already published three novels, so it's not the kind of thing that's going to go away with experience or with a book deal. It's also not weak to doubt yourself. It's human.
The difference between you and the person who will never write their book though, is taking the steps to understand and integrate those fears and not let them stop you from actually writing.
Tip #5: Write like you talk
The fifth tip is to write like you talk. Several times over the years, people have told me that I write like I talk. And for a long time, I didn't know whether that was a compliment or not. I wondered, is that a good thing? Or am I supposed to be writing like Shakespeare and not how I talk? I truly didn't know.
But over time, working with other writers and teaching writers, I've come to believe that it's a good thing to write like you talk because a lot of writers put too much pressure on themselves to sound literary. Sometimes it can be hard to even follow a sentence or figure out what's happening in a scene because someone has tried so hard to be artful and it ends up being too wordy or flowery, or difficult to follow.
And listen, I'm not immune. I've caught myself doing it. Ironically, I think this phenomenon of weighing down a paragraph with the necessary evil of words can happen when we're so focused on creating beautiful prose that the prose stops reading like natural speech. It doesn't sound like the way people talk.
On the other hand, I've worked with people who assure me that they are not writers. And then when I read what they've written, I can't put it down. It's really good, and by good I mean, I can't put it down. I'm engaged in it. I want to keep reading. I want to turn the pages and almost invariably what these people are doing that's so effective is they're writing like they speak.
Sometimes the solution to curing writer's block and moving ahead is simply to tell the story. Don't suss it up. Don't tease it out and drown it in hairspray. Just tell it like you're telling it to a friend. Make it as easy as possible for yourself and the words might start flowing.
Tip #6: Do something else
The sixth tip for pushing past writer's block is to do something else. And no, I don't mean give up on your dream. What I mean is to just give yourself the time to do something else for awhile.
Take a walk, do your laundry, knit a sweater, you know, free yourself up from the pressure of writing. Have you ever gotten a brilliant idea for your story in the shower? I certainly have.
And that's what I'm talking about. When you are consciously engaged with another task, you free your subconscious up to do some tinkering behind the scenes. And that can sometimes be how we stumble on those aha moments.
You may know the story of Isaac Newton having the concept of gravity pop into his head after watching an apple fall from a tree.
Well, we can't be one hundred percent sure if that actually happened, but I bet that it did because it actually makes sense. Newton gave his conscious brain the freedom to do something else, sitting under a tree, watching the world around him, and that primed him to be receptive to a new idea when it did come to him.
Tip #7: Embrace the lesser evil
Last but not least, the seventh tip is to embrace the lesser evil. This may sound like a rehash of the resistance point I mentioned earlier, but I'm repeating it because recognizing the fear that your book will not be exactly what you imagined is a huge game changer.
So I want to be honest with you about something. The book you write is going to be a disappointment in some ways. It always is for me. I am literally always a little bit disappointed in every book I write, but I know that's just part of the process. Because the vision in your head is always perfect.
Our imaginations don't imagine the flaws, the humanity of it. And so when it becomes a real thing in the world, it's not going to be as perfect as the vision was, because it didn't really exist.
Here's the thing, the disappointment of having written something that was better in your head is still better than not writing the book that you have in your head, burning inside you and gnawing at you forever.
When I compare those two feelings—the unwritten draft that I'm dying to write that I haven't written yet and the slight feeling of disappointment that the book I have written isn't as perfect as it was in my head—there’s no question which I prefer. I would much rather have the latter. I prefer to disappoint myself. I prefer to have something. I prefer to act as opposed to feeling impotent and paralyzed.
The slight disappointment of having written something that was better in my head is still a better feeling than the emotional weight of an unwritten book burning inside me.
Ready to write your book?
Speaking of a book burning inside you, maybe you’d love to write your book but you don't know how to find the time, or you haven't written a creative word in years. Or maybe you're the opposite. Maybe you have an MFA in creative writing, but it sucked all the fun out of it, and now you're stuck.
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