Website Update/Writer’s Block
Writing » Announcements, Work-in-Progress, Writer's BlockAugust 28th, 2006
I changed the layout of my website (found here), edited some text, etc. Also changed the colors of this blog.
As you may have guessed, I’m going through writer’s block. I find that when I’m stuck, I need to start reading again. Or doing more research. Or, not think about writing at all, but work on my other projects (which include working on my comic, performing another T-shirt surgery, balancing my account, and, unfortunately, Facebook haha).
What do you do to combat the Writer’s Block?
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August 30th, 2006 at 3:39 pm
Usually if I get stuck, I just sit tight with the ‘what if?’ game. Just ask ‘what if?’ to anything and everything… no matter how silly it seems… ‘What if I started fusing into my seat?’
Eventually something just sparks as perfect. Sometimes reading a tabloid magazine/newspaper can be brilliant, the stories are so silly and can be an inspirational goldmine.
For getting the urge to write? I talk to a friend also interested in writing about daydreams of my future book-cover, reviews, offers of publication…
It’s not very helpful in itself but certainly makes me want to pick up a pen.
August 30th, 2006 at 6:21 pm
I’ve also found that listening to music (especially music that I feel suits the mood of the piece I’m writing) works nicely. Because I write romance, sometimes it helps to watch a couple movies, too, just to get back into the feel of it.
I’m glad to hear someone else works out how their future book-cover will look! I have a whole folder of images that I’ve found online that represent what I would like as my own future book cover. Sometimes it’s just working with the piece, any facet of it (just as you said, the cover, possible reviews, publisher offers, etc), to stay happy, familiar with the piece, and therefore ready to continue working on it.
August 30th, 2006 at 6:27 pm
Well alot of people say dreaming of a writing career isn’t doing it, but it never hurts to have positive thoughts between the actual work.
Some of my happiest daydreams are getting my first publisher and seeing my book on shelves.
It’s nice to hear that someone on what is a very different genre to my own (I’m a horror junkie) uses similar techniques to help stimulate their creativity.
Out of curiousity, were you/are you blocked ideas-wise or passion-wise?
I get perfection blocks mostly… that whole ‘this isn’t good enough, something is wrong’.
August 30th, 2006 at 6:51 pm
You’re right. Dreaming of a writing career isn’t doing it. But you’re already a step ahead–you’re not just writing a story and hoping someone will see how great it is, you’re planning the cover, which translates into “What sort of marketing would work with my story?” Continue with that. It’s a huge, important part of a writing career, and looks good to publishers. It shows you are investing your time and energy same as they are.
I have found that, even though the genres are different, writing is writing. Learning tricks to break through writer’s block is a universal problem!
I’m not sure I’ve ever lost my passion. But then again, I’m a full-time undergraduate student working for a Computer Science & Engineering degree…so the demands of being a student takes over my time (sometimes three months at a time), and so I push my all-consuming passion aside. Because I’m worrying about school, it takes care of the passion/idea block automatically.
During my breaks, such as summer right now, I usually run out of ideas. I too am a perfectionist, and this summer, I decided to try something different: every time I felt blocked, I wrote through it. I forced myself to put something, anything, to the paper and hoped it would be good enough. The next day, I would read over the previous day, take out what I didn’t like, flesh out what I did, and write another thousand words or so. Somehow, I managed to write around 20,000 words in a month or so.
But that was back when I had a plan. Characters that I thought would be tertiary became secondary and more interesting, and suddenly I realized that the ending I had in mind, or at least, that last third of the novel, doesn’t fit with where the novel is going now. And that is where the block happened.
So now, I’m waiting for the characters to tell me where they want to go. After throwing a book’s worth of problems at them, they have to sort through where they want to end up, and I am patiently waiting.