Showing posts with label stuck. Show all posts

It's Called Writer's Block

Write RCS: We get stuck. I get stuck. Writers get stuck. Writers get unstuck.

Writers get unstuck! We can get unstuck with better feedback. An excellent source of good feedback is a writing group. Your own writing group like the ones I've written of in other posts, is more helpful than most casual conversations and usually less threatening. A search for "writing" and "groups" and "writing groups" may come up with something interesting.

If you have writers block right now, try :

thinking about the meaning, not the words, of what you are about to write helps. Think about your meaning, then find the best words.
taking some time to consider what is going on with you
just resting a bit.
completing some business.

Doing the following has gotten writers unstuck:

~ Look for contrasting or conflicting elements in what you have written or about to write.

You can interact with those elements when you find them. Just finding an example of one such element and naming it can help.

~ Try just babbling on in you writing. You may find yourself being not so nice or less agreeable than usual. You might even begin talking back to yourself. Try not to shut yourself down too fast. Let each voice say what it has to say in your writing. Let each argument build a bit. Don't stop yet. Let each voice make it's point.

~ I get frustrated and imagine that you do too. Let their movement, some movement. Again let let each and every voice have it's say before you shut it down. No one is looking. Some writing may occur.

~ Try more meaning before words. Develop the meaning of the words you are using. Clarify those meanings. Fit word to meaning.

~ Keep writing even if you only write why your writing doesn't make sense. Keep writing for 10 or 20 minutes. Then try to get yourself to step back and look at what you have written with some perspective. You may discover that you have written verbless phrases or that nothing you asserts anything. A few verbs and a couple of assertions may improve your writing.

~ Sit back. Look at your writing and try to see what it adds up to. Going back and forth between immersing yourself in your writing and then sitting back to gain perspective is writing. As Mr. Elbow says, "You are cooking."

~ At times it is good to let yourself get a bit extreme, to be emotional. Let each impulse have its day. Sometimes it seems that one has a cycle to go through before you get down to better writing. Such a time may well be the time to take to extremes for a while. Take it to the limit one more time. Later you can be the ruthless editor with a sharp knife.

I get stuck less these days. When I do get stuck, I know what I can do to get unstuck pronto.

Write us a comment below. Bye for now.

by R. Carroll Sheehan

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You Can Write: Stuck? You don't have to fight to get unstuck

Write With RCS: It Seems we can all feel stuck. It can feel so bad that one may feel like giving up. When it gets that bad you can do this:

Talk out loud. keep talking out-loud as though some one were listening. Talk about comparing words to meanings. Talk about cooking and growing. If that doesn't work or you can't do it. quit.

I don't mean that you should quit forever, I mean just lay your work aside for a time. You want to write and there are actions you can take to start you writing and keep you writing until you write something good. You might take some time to consider what is going on with you, Are you hungry? Is there something in your life that needs doing other than your writing.

By the way, "talking out-loud" and the rest of that little paragraph above could prove helpful.

Do you have notes? Keep your notebook and a writing implement handy. You notes can help your writing. The little essays I've posted about writing here are not much more than my good notes. Check out the other pieces available on this blog. They are intended to be helpful.

Right now you might try sitting Comfortably and completing a writing cycle. What's a writing cycle? Its easy if you have a timer, watch, or clock. I have a little timer I like. If you have one, set it for ten minutes. You are about to do ten minutes of focused involved writing and then stopping to see what it adds up to, or what it is trying to add up to. Your focus might b your topic or theme. Your involvement might be sincerely writing that which you feel. For perhaps a worst case example, you might have written, "I'm stuck, stuck stuck and it sucks, sucks, sucks!" It might not be deeply sincere, but it could be an approach to your feelings.

To complete a writing cycle start putting words and sentences on paper and keep doing that for ten minutes. A timer is useful. No need to be much concerned about quality yet. Try to include include something that you know you wanted to write about. When you complete your full ten minutes, stop for a minute and then look back over that which you have written. Then try to write a sentence or two or even a short paragraph of what your cycle seems to be trying to add up to. So, you are reviewing what you have written. Good for you. When you come to a thought, feeling, perception, image you can gather up into one sentence or assertion, do so. Write it down.

You wrote. You are writing. You are a writer. Do not be squeamish about letting yourself write badly. You are writing. You are a writer.

In your next writing project your purpose could be to cook and grow and not take your work as a disaster to be stamped out. Keep writing. Self-development and growth are occurring as you write. Such personal growth and development is not a waste of time. It is a big deal, an important happening. When you cooperate with the process it is a great doing. Keep writing and keep growing.

You might at some point try to see cooking and growing as a sort of global task; seeing all your writing as interdependent, seeing that no parts are complete until all parts are done, seeing that you want to get your material to interact, seeing that the important interaction is writing and summing up, and seeing what it means to alternately work in words and work in meanings.

little warning; I can imagine one of us trying to do all of the above at once and so doing experience a sudden and extended case of crossed eyes. There are some valuable suggestions above that which may best be considered one at a time, beginning, say, tomorrow.

Understanding what it means to see your writing as interdependent can better your writing. No need to do it all today. Cooking and growing take time and can be better done with your conscious cooperation.

You can let your goal be good writing. Your best writing is probably mixed-up with with your worst writing. You can find some excellent parts in what you have written. Some of your best sounds, rhythms, and textures, and some of your best insights may come from your most careless writing.

Your purpose on a final draft and editing might be to get your meaning straight and to use the best words you can to express that meaning.

There is a reason for the "comment" page below. I love to read comments on specific posts. I read them and try to answer each one.

Keep writing.

RCS