Yes...Another Rant Book (OLD discontinued)

Writer's Block

      It's about time I ranted about this. Every writer goes through it, and every writer hates it. There's nothing worse than opening up your story and just staring at it. You keep staring and staring at it, drawing a complete blank, and absolutely nothing comes to mind. Then it sucks even more if you have an idea of what will happen after the part you're on, but you can't get past the scene right before it. You always look back at the last line you wrote and hate yourself for writing it because then you don't know how to phrase what happens next.

     When writer's block gets prolonged, that's when your world starts to crumble. It's been a few days, alright then. Take a break, maybe play some video games or go talk to people, catch up on some schoolwork (heh, like that'll happen) and come back to writing later. But when you come back after a few days and still don't know what to write? I don't know, cry maybe? I hate when I'm just sitting there with that same stupid line I wrote last glaring at me. Next thing you know, it's been a week. Then two weeks. Then a month. By then, you just want to smash your head through a wall, or pound it on a desk, or kick a chair, or any other absurd activity that will quell your rage.

    Asking how to overcome writer's block doesn't really do much either. The people who post threads about it are most likely in that scenario I just described. The ones who reply and give advice mean well, but it's usually the same thing: listen to music, read your favorite book, watch a good T.V show or movie, or climb Mt. Everest. The last one isn't true, but if you're at the one month of writer's block point (like me) then you may as well. Thing is, most of these methods don't work, or they don't work for me at least. When I read or watch something inspiring, it makes me think of the more exciting parts of my story. That's helpful if I'm on an action scene, but if I'm on one of the more relaxed parts of my story, all it does is distract me.

    So what to do? You've read that book, watched that movie, discussed things with fellow writers and still can't think of anything. My answer is, do nothing. No joke, this is like the magic conch shell in SpongeBob. The sad reality of writer's block is that there's really not much you can do about it. It's like a cold. You can find ways to make it suck less, but the most you can do is wait for it to go away. Writer's block can't last forever.

    But the good news is, you can get what I call an "writing epiphany". It will come whenever your brain lets it. This usually happens when you're listening to music or sitting around with nothing to do. Maybe scratch what I said before. To overcome writer's block, you have to take time out of your day to sit and think. Meditation is recommended as well. Just sit there and ponder what you'll write next. Force your brain to conjure something up. It's surprisingly tough, but most of the time it does the trick. It's not a good idea to do that while staring at the evil last line. Maybe lie on your bed or something.

     One thing that bothers me is when people say "just force yourself to write". Now that's similar to pondering it, but the problem is, trying to force yourself to write lowers the quality of your writing. You can't get into it, can't feel the scenes, and then you get this "trickling" effect. You'll maybe write one line one day and then a paragraph the next. You might change stuff around, rewrite your evil last sentence, but overall, you won't get into anything. Then your writing starts to sound choppy and out of place. It will lose the flow you had when you were having your last writing epiphany. Now, will this go for everyone? Of course not. Trickling can be helpful, but it's very frustrating.

    Bottom line, sit and think. Wait for another writing epiphany or just sit and think about how much writer's block sucks.