Articles
about Overcoming Writer's Block!
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Relax and Write
Relax and
overcome writers block...
Listen, I know you like to work
hard at things. You love (...or love to hate) racking your
brain, searching your mind, struggling to come up with the
perfect idea, concept or turn of phrase...
You might rewrite and revise and redo -- almost endlessly
-- in search of that perfect turn of phrase or killer
surprise or insight. Does ‘it’ seem to be just out of
reach, on the tip of your mind? Very frustrating. There's a
root cause of this and a couple simple steps to bust this
writer block...
The cause is the internal pressure you put on yourself to
produce great writing. Good does not ever seem good enough.
It's a fine balance -- the drive to be great can produce
greatness or... it can sabotage your ever completing
anything. Somehow you must set aside that self referential
drive to be good enough in order to produce. And then,
after editing, you must again let that pressure go in order
to "subject your writing to the scrutiny of readers".
Aaakkk! It can be a hard step, if you don't
have a
strategy.
You might even have started talking to yourself. (Under
stress, I do it out loud and I highly recommend it for
keeping all sorts of unsavory characters away from you... I
digress.)
If you try too hard, you will just stay in our own way. In
fact if you try at all, you're in your own way. If someone
says to you, "OK, I'll try and come over on Saturday
night", don't you know they are not coming?
Stop trying. No try, just do. All creativity comes from
your unconscious mind, so let "it" produce without you
having to "do" much at all.
Talking to yourself while you are relaxing though, is self
defeating. Your conscious mind operates mostly through your
internal dialogue. Any behavior that you can practice
regularly that slows down or stops your internal dialogue
is proven to drastically increase your creativity.
Relaxation exercises will help you in overcoming writer's
block, because they slow or even stop your incessant
internal dialogue.
Relax -- then write. Here are some options:
1. Do a relaxation or meditation session for 30 minutes.
Use a recorded, guided session to slow your mind down and
relax.
2. Do some conscious breathing -- breathe in for a count of
four and out for a count of five. Over and over for ten
minutes or more. Pay attention to all the aspects of your
breathing. Move your attention from one point to another in
a gradual movement... like the feel of the breath going
through your nostrils, the rise and fall of your chest and
stomach, the cool feel of the inhale and the warm feel of
the exhale, and the sounds your breathing makes... let your
attention move from the top of your head to your toes...
let go any tension you notice in your body...
You can use your fingers to as a guide to how deeply you
are breathing -- raise up on the inhale let down on the
exhale. Deep and slower
breathing, slows your thoughts and lets tension spill out
of your body.
3. Take a long hot shower, until the water runs cold.
Concentrate on letting go, relaxing and taking your time.
Ease the internal pressure.
4. Sit in front of the fireplace, stare at the fire and
de-stress. Step back a bit and watch your thoughts; let
them float by while you somewhat disinterestedly notice
what they are, without participating... without adding to
them... without commenting or getting involved in those
thoughts... like you are watching someone else's thoughts
or movie. Spend 20 to 30 minutes doing this "watching
without participating".
Then right after whichever of these options you use, go
straight to the keyboard and fly at it. Let your
unconscious mind express without editing; at all! Go ahead
and let it out. Make some mistakes and not correct them.
Go... keep going... let the words fall onto the page.
Relaxation and releasing stress will aid you in whole brain
thinking. That will allow the inspiration to begin to work
it’s way out, onto the paper. Write as though someone else
was writing and you are just watching them do it.
A necessary helper, that can easily turn overbearing is
your internal critic. Its like there's someone over your
shoulder, watching everything you write and commenting on
it right after you finish a paragraph, sentence or word.
"Why'd you pick that, that doesn't make sense, do it
again... do it again" it squawks...
Your edit function is necessary and useful -- in the
appropriate place and time during your writing process! The
two times and places where it is a hindrance is during the
draft stage and during the submit stage. The most tortured
by self doubt, famous writers had mechanism's that allowed
them to suspend the internal critic and resulting doubt, in
order to produce and submit their writing.
Release the "internal critic", at will. Here are some
options:
1. Tell it to "Shut the Fuck up"
1. Pretend the writing is done by someone else.
2. Negotiate with the part.
3. Change it's voice tone.
4. Move it to diffuse it's power.