Writer’s Block: How to Get Yourself Started
We all know what the most challenging thing is about writing: getting started. With all the amazing ideas oscillating in your mind and all the world turning around you, sometimes it is easy to forget to finish something you first need to start. Here are some ways you can try to motivate yourself:
Connect with your idea
While a lot of great ideas go through your head, try connecting with the one that excites you the most. Think about which idea has more space to play with. Choose the one that you have the most content on.
Don’t start from the scratch
This one is a tricky one but never start a piece from scratch. When a good story pops up, you start having key words and main images, maybe even certain quotes you might use. NOTE THOSE DOWN. It can be bullet notes, it can be diagrams, it can be words and shapes messily noted around. It doesn’t matter. It is very important to just keep notes and not forget the specific details you come up with, while thinking about broader concepts. Once you have a clear line of what you will write, it is so much easier to complete your story.
Find an initiative
Sometimes you have ideas that you connect, but you never seem to have time or you just don’t feel like it, or can’t come up with a unique topic. That’s okay. We all go through writer’s block. Don’t let it consume you. Search for competitions, local magazines, newspapers, blogs (*wink*, *wink*), anything to get you writing and maybe even give you a theme. Just don’t stop writing for long. It gets harder to get back into it.
Re-write
You don’t have any new ideas but old ones that you weren’t satisfied with? Don’t give up on those. While you wait for your inspiration, try giving another shot to old ideas. Who knows, maybe you’ll end up writing something you’ll be proud of.
Get Inspired
As I said earlier, it is easier to start from something rather than from scratch. So, get yourself some inspiration by looking at stories that have already been written. Read some books, watch some movies or series to inspire you. Sometimes a tiny detail in someone else’s story can inspire one to create a whole new world.
Start Chatting
If you’re stuck with a particular idea but can’t develop it, instead of tossing it away or spending days staring at the blank page, speak to someone about it. The more you talk about your idea, the more you’ll discover your idea. And maybe the person you speak with can give you other ideas to expand on your idea. The rest will come with a snowball effect.
Take a Break
Stressing, doubting about yourself, staring at the blank page and the clock ticking. A writer’s worst nightmare. Staying in the same position and waiting for the muse to come would only be having you trapped in that nightmare. It would be like sleep paralysis, actually. You’re neither sleeping nor awake. You want to scream but you can’t. So, what do you do? Stop the pointless fight. Let yourself relax and wake up. Go have a cup of coffee, do things you love, listen to music, go for a walk, meditate… anything that makes you feel calm. I know, you probably think that you don’t have time for a break but think about it, you can spend an hour sitting still, worrying and still not writing a word, or you can use that hour to calm yourself down. In both cases, aren’t you spending an hour not writing? Yes, you are and if you ask me, for the second hour, the second scenario holds more hope.
Write About Your Writer’s Block
If not anything, at the point of writer’s block, you know one thing the best: your writer’s block. Write about that, maybe not in a planned way to get you even more stress but let yourself free-write, express how you feel about your writer’s block. Desperate? Scared? Depressed? That’s the feeling that might fuel the next best thing you create.
Do you have other techniques to motivate yourself to write? Let us know in the comments.
©️ Photo by Andrew Seaman on Unsplash
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