• Read this: http://absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?288931-Guidelines-for-Participation-in-Outwitting-Writer-s-Block

    before you post.

Is there a pattern in your writer's block?

Status
Not open for further replies.

sunandshadow

Impractical Fantasy Animal
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Apr 17, 2005
Messages
4,827
Reaction score
336
Location
Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Website
home.comcast.net
I just never seem to have plot ideas, or at least not ones that can be assembled into a complete pot structure. I don't like a lot of commonly-seen plot events and plot types, so I want to do something different, but I don't know what. I dislike high-conflict stories and prefer low to medium amounts of conflict, which puts a lot of the "how to plot" books that are around in direct philosophical opposition to me.

So if I try to create a plot outline before writing, I usually end up with one that has major holes I can't fill satisfactorily. If I just start writing I usually resolve my initial problem and don't have a new difficulty waiting in the wings to replace it.
 

DragonHeart

Oerba Yun Fang
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jun 16, 2005
Messages
2,479
Reaction score
245
Location
New Hampshire
Website
www.thefinalfantasy.com
My block happens when I stop writing. I'm serious. I tend to stop when it gets hard. I've been slowly identifying when this happens and just making myself work through it.

With first drafts it's usually when I get frustrated with the writing. I'm less and less convinced about the notion of allowing myself to write "crap" as the saying goes, just for the sake of having the words on the paper. I'm sure it works for others, but I just end up with poorly paced, bland and stereotypical stories.

Revisions are usually a pain because of the massive gap between my natural 'talent' and my technical skills. As noted above, my first drafts are of very rough quality and I often find myself having to rework or add entire scenes. It takes me so much longer than it should because I fight with every page down to the words.

It's easier to throw my hands up and claim a block when the truth is I just don't want to work on it anymore. I can go months without writing because of this, when I am actually perfectly capable of doing it. I need to develop a better system for handling these types of workflow issues. And a better method of drafting because rough first drafts just aren't doing it for me.
 

Layla Nahar

Seashell Seller
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 6, 2007
Messages
7,655
Reaction score
913
Location
Seashore
... but the event that follows that initial one is usually triggered by something that blocks the solution or satisfactory climax to that first interesting situation.

I have trouble figuring this out - what do do with that initial situation. I've made the analogy before, but there's an old cartoon where the character is walking and the landscape is being drawn before him, so it's all vivid where he's walking but ahead there is the blank region. It seems like what ever is the 'thing' the moves the initial situation, it's in the un-drawn region - I am at a loss to find it. The drawn part, the initial interesting situation is very vivid, I can write that, but the thing that makes everything change - that's in the undrawn part. I have had some stories that came with the clarity about how to move from the initial event to the next and I have finished those, but they are very rare.



But it's amazing how often one can unblock simply by working on self compassion.

I've done a lot of this work - I've made progress, but I still have lots of 'block' troubles...
 

Old Hack

Such a nasty woman
Super Moderator
Absolute Sage
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jun 12, 2005
Messages
22,454
Reaction score
4,956
Location
In chaos
I have trouble figuring this out - what do do with that initial situation. I've made the analogy before, but there's an old cartoon where the character is walking and the landscape is being drawn before him, so it's all vivid where he's walking but ahead there is the blank region. It seems like what ever is the 'thing' the moves the initial situation, it's in the un-drawn region - I am at a loss to find it. The drawn part, the initial interesting situation is very vivid, I can write that, but the thing that makes everything change - that's in the undrawn part. I have had some stories that came with the clarity about how to move from the initial event to the next and I have finished those, but they are very rare.





I've done a lot of this work - I've made progress, but I still have lots of 'block' troubles...

Are you any good at visualisation? Because if so, try doing a brief meditation before you start work, to get into the zone a bit; then write until you feel yourself blocked (which might be straight away!) and at that point, visualise your character or characters walking towards the undrawn landscape; then visualise them turning round, and talking about the landscape behind them. They might well tell you details you hadn't noticed before, and in describing their journey to reach this point give you more information about their destination.

Yes, it sounds ridiculous. But yes, it can work.

- - - Updated - - -
 

Layla Nahar

Seashell Seller
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 6, 2007
Messages
7,655
Reaction score
913
Location
Seashore
Are you any good at visualisation? Because if so, try doing a brief meditation before you start work, to get into the zone a bit; then write until you feel yourself blocked (which might be straight away!) and at that point, visualise your character or characters walking towards the undrawn landscape; then visualise them turning round, and talking about the landscape behind them. They might well tell you details you hadn't noticed before, and in describing their journey to reach this point give you more information about their destination.

Yes, it sounds ridiculous. But yes, it can work.

I think this sounds like a very good idea. Actually, because I like it so much, I want to ask you another question. I think I'm pretty good at visualizing. The 'undrawn landscape' refers metaphorically to things like this: I have a guy - he's an administrator in a castle, competent, a bit solitary, maybe too comfortable - and he's a foreigner - it's winter morning & he's going through his papers and one of them has something written on it that is out of the ordinary. What's written on that paper (or parchment?) is the kind of undrawn landscape that I'm talking about.

I know what this guy looks like, what he's wearing, his name, the book's title, I know what the landscape around the castle is like, but try as I might, I fail utterly to get any clarity or intuition concerning what that communication might be about. (What ever it is, it would be part of the story-advancing mechanism - that problem that the MC has to solve... I know that much. & that might be part of why I'm so anxious about it and getting stuck there...)

I was wondering, given the very interesting suggestion you made, if you might have anything that might help for a problem like the one I describe.

Also, I would be very grateful if you might have some suggestions for meditation. (I don't really do much of it so I'm not sure how to do that part of you suggestion)

And - I wanted to say thanks again for sharing that idea.
 

Poppies

Delicious potato pancakes
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2017
Messages
27
Reaction score
0
Location
Field
Website
www.poppywrites.com
The last time I wrote an extensive outline, which honestly wasn't that detailed, I ended up losing interest. Rather than relying on my creativity to write, I kept going back to this list of things that were supposed to happen in this specific sequence, and I felt boxed in to write the story only in that way. The idea of ditching the outline either didn't occur to be or make sense at the time. I got bored of it, and moved on. Since then, I've stuck to really bare bone notes, and make major plot development as I go. I don't even write a bare bones outline until after the first chapter.

My chronic writer's block is getting 30,000 to 50,000 words deep into the story, and just getting stuck. I worry that the story's too out there, it's not general enough, and it won't attract an audience, so I'm either disgusted with the entire story and want start over completely, or I take the beginning scene and rewrite from there. Rewriting from the opening scene has never been successful because I'm still the one who's writing it. I also have these secondary issues that have to do with characterization, setting, and other things like that. Say, I imagine a secondary antagonist as an old woman, and that makes sense in my mind for a lot of reasons, and to me it's important that she's an old woman with political power. On the other hand, it would make sense, and be more acceptable as a big cliche, and maybe even less offensive if the secondary antagonist is a wealthy, old, white man with political power. I get a second opinion, and they agree. I start off with the secondary antagonist as an old white man, but I can't continue until I fix the wrong. This problem stays in the back of my mind until I go back to my original vision. If not, I'll even get upset at the person who agreed with me, and they'll have no idea. This little problem will snowball into a huge problem, and I'll eventually want to give up the whole story because if I sacrifice one small thing, then I've naturally sacrificed plenty of other things to make it more acceptable and general. In the end, my original vision is gone, which leads to the anxiety and being unable to write anymore.

Like Old Hack said earlier in the post, self-compassion goes a long way. I've been watching self-help videos on YouTube, and they've helped me sort through all of that and not live in fear.
 

Old Hack

Such a nasty woman
Super Moderator
Absolute Sage
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jun 12, 2005
Messages
22,454
Reaction score
4,956
Location
In chaos
I think this sounds like a very good idea. Actually, because I like it so much, I want to ask you another question. I think I'm pretty good at visualizing. The 'undrawn landscape' refers metaphorically to things like this: I have a guy - he's an administrator in a castle, competent, a bit solitary, maybe too comfortable - and he's a foreigner - it's winter morning & he's going through his papers and one of them has something written on it that is out of the ordinary. What's written on that paper (or parchment?) is the kind of undrawn landscape that I'm talking about.

I know what this guy looks like, what he's wearing, his name, the book's title, I know what the landscape around the castle is like, but try as I might, I fail utterly to get any clarity or intuition concerning what that communication might be about. (What ever it is, it would be part of the story-advancing mechanism - that problem that the MC has to solve... I know that much. & that might be part of why I'm so anxious about it and getting stuck there...)

I was wondering, given the very interesting suggestion you made, if you might have anything that might help for a problem like the one I describe.

I wonder if you've read Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down The Bones? I've found it very useful in all sorts of ways but the main point is that when you sit down to write you keep your pen moving no matter what, and you use everything you have to to keep that happening. So if you're distracted by a dog barking nearby you write something like, "there's a dog barking and it's pulling my concentration away from this thing I should be writing, which is about a woman in a garden and she doesn't have a dog but if she did it would be small and dark and angry and..."

She gives a lot more than that in her books, and is very helpful. Some people really don't like her work, but I have gained a lot from it.

If you are struggling to hear what the man you describe is telling you, there are ways round that. It might be that he has nothing to tell you. He could be vaccuous and dull and entirely without opinion. In which case you could write about what people think of him, or about the papers on his desk, or about how he sits there all day looking out of the window and making a point to ignore you. Or you could ask him why he's not talking to you. It might be that he's being very secretive about the papers on his desk, or that he can't read so doesn't know what's on them, or that they're in a language which is foreign to him.

There are all sorts of ways you can go with this. But I know it's not helpful for me to tell you this bit! What's happening is you're seeing him, you're reaching that problematical part of the story again and again, and you're panicking and freezing. You might find it useful to abandon this part of the story for now, and write a different scene. It could be that you don't need to write this part, or don't need to write it yet. But if you absolutely have to, then this is where meditation comes in (for me, at least).

Also, I would be very grateful if you might have some suggestions for meditation. (I don't really do much of it so I'm not sure how to do that part of you suggestion)

And - I wanted to say thanks again for sharing that idea.

When we feel our inner editor peering over our shoulders, telling us stuff like, "that's not very good," or, "you can't do this, can you?" what we're doing is being far too hard on ourselves. We're judging ourselves, and telling ourselves we are failures. The answer, therefore, is to be kinder to ourselves! It sounds obvious, and far too easy to be helpful. However, I have spent a lot of time looking into the mechanics of writers' block, and (without sharing several thousand words of research and interviews, etc) I'm convinced that a lack of self compassion is at the root of it.

When writing is going at its very best, writers reach a state of almost trance-like concentration. The writing seems to flow, effortlessly and beautifully. It's glorious when you're there, but so very difficult to reach this point with any regularity. Again, I've researched this over the years and the most effective way to reach this state is through regular mediation. I've used hypnosis and self-hypnosis too, but I am ridiculously easy to hypnotise, so it's not necessarily the best route for everyone. The hypnotic trance state is very similar to the "flow" state, though, so you could consider it.

If you bring these two strands together (the lack of self compassion, and the flow state) it stands to reason, therefore, that a relatively easy fix is to try out some self compassion meditation.

I've worked with a few blocked writers over the years using these principles, and it's worked for all of them.

Google something like "free self compassion meditation" and you'll find hundreds of results. Some are great, some are awful. The ones I like you might find horrid. But there are so many out there that it doesn't matter. Find someone whose voice you like, and have a go. I find just five or ten minutes before each writing session works a treat. If I couple that with a long walk first, it goes even better. And what's great is that it's cumulative. The more you do it, the better it gets. Just trust in the meditation, and if it doesn't work recognise you've done your job: you've turned up, you've meditated, you've written, so you've succeeded. Don't fall into the habit of being angry with yourself for not writing enough, or well enough: that's what leads to blocks in the first place.

Is that a help? I hope so.
 

Layla Nahar

Seashell Seller
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 6, 2007
Messages
7,655
Reaction score
913
Location
Seashore
Hey thanks for all that. I'm cogitating...
I got a copy of 'Writing Down the Bones' at the library. I looked at it before; I'll give it another go. Again, thanks.
 

PhoenixRising360

Registered
Joined
Feb 22, 2017
Messages
7
Reaction score
0
Location
East Tennessee, USA
I have two different types of writer's block:

1. The type after I come down from Intense Writing Mode. I imagine it's sort of an equivalent to a drug crash (though probably not as physically destructive). I feel drained, unimaginative, and weary. Usually, when this happens, I need to rest from writing and let my batteries recharge, so to speak. This period generally lasts a few days to maybe a week.

2. I get a type of writer's block when I've written myself into a corner, so to speak. When this happens, this tells me that the direction my muse went hit a dead end and I need to pause, re-read where things started to go off course and backtrack and try a different direction. I very much picture it as being in a car driving and there's a wall in front of me. You can't go any further in this direction. Turn around and go back to where the story was still working. Once I do that, I can usually drive the story where it should go. Sometimes this process takes longer. Sometimes I have to let it sit a few days and simmer before I can 'see' where it went awry.

I usually have multiple WIPs going at once so if I don't feel like working on one thing, I have other stories to work on if I wish. My writer's block is very situational and so far, never long-term.
 

Keithy

Just keep swimming
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 23, 2017
Messages
1,547
Reaction score
76
Location
Ireland
It's very odd but although I'm on my third draft, I suddenly realised a chapter was really really utterly boring. So I panicked, and felt like giving up. Took me two days to recover and three to rewrite it (to produce the same result another way)

Now I'm having problems with Adverbs. :-(
 

JNG01

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 5, 2017
Messages
212
Reaction score
53
Mine is always a function of letting my inner editor start whispering while I'm in initial drafting mode. He whispers, then he shouts, then next thing I know I'm staring at the cursor and not writing at all. When I resolve to just let the first-draft writing be as bad as first-draft writing can be and force myself to write in spite of that, the blocked sensation ebbs over a session or two.

80% of the time, it's not nearly as bad as I thought when I finally go back to revise. (Prefer not to talk about the other 20% . . . .).
 

andiwrite

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jul 9, 2012
Messages
1,482
Reaction score
140
Location
In constant transit
Yes! Now that I've worked on a handful of different books, I am seeing a pattern. I tend to get blocked up during the first major rewrite. I never block during the rough draft because I do something similar to Natalie Goldberg's suggestion that Old Hack pointed out. I just keep going no matter what. I have parts of my first drafts that go something like "And then some stuff happened that got them fives mile down the road, and then some other stuff happened and then (important plot turning point I know I must reach)"

I used to be a huge outline person, but I'm trying a new technique with my latest WIP which is sort of a mix between pantsing and outlining. Hard to explain, but the way I do my first drafts, it's pretty impossible to get stuck.

It's the second draft where it gets difficult. There are so many options and I often get overwhelmed at how hard it is to balance all the different characters, all the scenes, which scenes should go where in what order, and what actually needs to happen. Since I start improving upon the writing on the second draft and making it... you know, ACTUAL writing, I don't want to waste a ton of time writing amazing passages that I'll only delete later. And I think this contributes to the mental block that sometimes leaves me sitting there for hours barely writing anything. There is always a point at this stage where I become overwhelmed, frustrated, and feel like giving up. The MS is usually a huge mess as I begin moving scenes around, and it's easy to get lost.

But one thing I have found every time is that if I keep pushing through that horrible uncomfortable feeling, there will always be a light at the end of the tunnel. At some point, the scenes start falling into place, things look more organized, and what is truly best for the story starts coming to me. So now I just recognize the discomfort and keep going no matter what.
 

Once!

Still confused by shoelaces
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Apr 22, 2012
Messages
2,965
Reaction score
433
Location
Godalming, England
Website
www.will-once.com
I thought it would be interesting to hear from others on this. Is there a certain point in the writing/editing process where you find yourself more likely to get writer's block?

For me, it always seems to come full force during revisions/editing when I am getting towards the end. That's when all my doubts start to creep in.

Hell, no. I can get stuck at any point. ;-)

Different books seem to have different sticking points. I wrote a serious sci-fi which fought me every step of the way - hard to start, hard to continue with and hard to edit. My next book has been stuck in the editing phase. I've got a historical novel that I'm struggling to get started. My WIP is moderately sticky at around 90% of first draft.

I am an expert on procrastination. I've had lots of practice.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.