I’m a hypocrite when it comes to writer’s block. If you were to come to me and ask me what I believe is the best way to overcome writer’s block I’d tell you “just keep grinding,” and for the most part I abide by that. Sometimes.
I’ve been struggling with a chapter in my work in progress for the past month. I’ve been tackling this problem with a combination of nose to the grind stone, sitting down at my writing desk every morning at 6:30 am for an hour and trying to force the words out, but nothing felt right and if I did write something I would just delete it the next day. I once deleted 1000 words I wrote the previous day because I realized that they were not the right worlds. The frustration got to me and I gave up for a week and a half where I barely even approached my project, and began to even curse myself for even starting it in the first place. This was amplified by the fact that for the past two and half months since I started this project I’ve been crusing. Every writing session the story had came to me so clearly, but out of nowhere I hit a brick wall, and I’ve been picking up the pieces and reassembling the wreckage. As of now I feel like I’ve reassembled about 70% of the vehicle, enough to move forward.
However, every book is an experiment of sorts. We learn a bit more about ourselves are writers and discover new things about writing. I thought I’d share a few things here in case you ever find yourself in a similar situation.
What I learned about myself as a writer:
– I’m a pantser / gardener / discovery writer by default. It’s my preferred approach to the craft. Perhaps because I plan out so much of my life & work life (heck, I’m an engineer & project manager at the day job, my entire career is planning), I like to be a bit more free form in my writing. However, this has a big drawback in that sometimes you can write yourself into blocks, corners, or dead ends more often than an outliner.
– My main goal of this project is to focus on vibes & character first. While my past project was plot heavy, this one the plot takes a backseat to my characters just vibing in a strange world. I’m drawing heavily from literary fiction in this case, but it still is a genre project, at least on the surface. However, when a plot point came to be, my mind started panicking. It wasn’t sure how to deal with this strange case of external drama in a project that’s so heavily focused on the internal drama, especially without killing the vibes of the project. Because of this, my mind has been in background problem solving mode, trying to rectify these two contradictions.
What I discovered about my writing process:
– Outlining is fine, especially to get yourself out of a corner or over a block (I can’t garuntee this for dead ends, those you just sometimes have to chop off. My previous project was built upon the dismembered limbs of abandoned plot lines, but that’s for another blogpost). Also the nice thing about outlines is that you don’t need to stick to them, they can be abandoned the moment their use is up, and you’re out of your jam. In my case I wanted my main character to meet somebody who will be foreshadowing things to come. However, I only really have the ending in mind. So I decided to do a reverse outline. I started from the end, worked backwards, only adding major beats that I think would interest me, and left plenty of room between them for my discovery self to be happy. It was enough to give me some focus and get my brain on the right track again.
– To solve the issue of genre in a literary inspired piece, I did something similar with a character profile for the person my main character is about to meet. I am still struggling a bit on the presentation of it, but it gave me some clarity. I haven’t fully written the part yet, but the solution I came up with was “typical harbinger moment, but muted.” I’ll see how the execution goes when I get to that part next week. ¯\_(ツ)\_/¯
– Most importantly: it’s not a bad thing to take breaks when you get blocks. Just don’t lean on them too long. Try to schedule them and set a timeline for when you plan on getting back to your desk. Maybe it’s a few hours, or maybe it’s a week. For me my goal was to get back to it after Summer Games Done Quick (a week long online charity speedrunning event that I try to catch whenever it’s on), and it turned out that that was just enough time for my mind to work on this in the background.
I’m sure I’ll have plenty more posts to come about my experiences with writer’s block. You never know when it’s going to hit, but when it does it’s best to take a moment, reflect, and find the right tools to get yourself over it.
Happy writing!
