Unfortunately, every quote I considered had something to do with not being able to write. Probably not the best thing to write about--not being able to write--and yet, a strangely familiar thing for me at the moment.
I've never had any problems sitting down and putting words on paper. Sometimes, those words even made sense. Frequently, those words formed themselves into sequential stories. And in the end, no matter whether I have my writer's hat or my editor's hat on, the stories are what drive me in all aspects of my life.
Which makes my life pretty damn cool.
Except that right now, I'm finding it difficult to make the time to write. All those 20 hour, 20,000 word days are now 20 hour, 20,000 (slight exaggeration for literary effect) email days. My editing time has taken away my writing time, save for...well, now. Three a.m. The house is quiet, my inboxes are clean-ish. I open up my WIP and...
I've lost the thread of the story.
So I have to take some time to read back through the last pages I wrote, so I can pick up the thru line. Fortunately, that doesn't take long. And then...and then...
It's seven in the morning and everyone's alarm clocks in the house start to go off.
*So, Celina, what's the point?*
The point is that writing is not always some bolt of inspiration. A Muse doesn't descend from the Olympian heights to inject 100,000 brilliant words in the correct order and then drops a wall to block the same writer from ever producing another coherent sentence.
Writing is work--difficult, painstaking, solitary work. The best way to cure writer's block? Write your way out of it. Instead of sitting there waiting for the heavenly choirs to hit a harmonized high "C" that hefts you over that block, make yourself write. It doesn't matter what you write. You can write an extremely creative grocery list. Just go to your writing place, sit in your writing chair, and WRITE. You may have to rearrange your mind from whatever it is you do when you're not writing--I certainly do--but once you've managed that, then write.
Or--
Inspiration is wonderful when it happens, but the writer must develop an approach for the rest of the time...the wait is simply too long. -- Leonard Bernstein
Thank God for www.quotationspage.com.
1 comment:
Writers block is such an evil evil thing, I had an 18 month block of pure evil nastiness where the only thing I could manage was Role-Playing threads, really sucked but something just drained all that inspiration after I finished a massive 100K book and 2 20K novellas. But its finally over with and I've managed to write 2 short stories and 3 novellas in the past year.
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