Is There Such a Thing as Writer's Block?
Most writers think they’re struggling with their writing when what they’re actually struggling with is their thinking.
It doesn’t feel like that, of course. I’m thinking just fine; I just can’t write.
Well, actually, you can write. You’ve demonstrated in the past you’re perfectly capable of turning out writing that is lyrical, inspirational, beautiful—even, on some rare magical occasions, important. So it’s not that you cannot write.
It’s that you’re currently unable to write. There’s a difference
Most writers self-diagnose their problem and come up with a quick and easy solution: they don’t write. “I need to step away from the project,” they’ll say, or, “I just need some space.”
I’m here to tell you: Not writing has little to no curative power. Not writing underlines helplessness; it reinforces your opinion that you can’t. How many projects have you planned to come back to, only to find the ongoing “writer’s block” outlasted your creativity, your ideas?
The idea of writer’s block can actually detach writing from its real context. When you treat writing challenges as psychological—rather than intellectual—then you minimize the intellect you bring to bear daily on your writing.
For most writers of both fiction and nonfiction, the key to writer’s block is sorting out what you think, and that sorting, for most of us, works best on the page. Think about it. Writing lists helps you think through what you need to do. Writing a social media post helps you think through how you want to respond to others in your social media environment. So writing through whatever psychological block is keeping you away from your writing is what is going to ultimately be successful. Writing can act as a strategy to get you back into writing; writing is itself the means of solving your writing problem.
When I broke my arm, my surgeon arranged for me to begin physical therapy two days after my operation. If I didn’t use the sore arm, it would atrophy. Not using it didn’t make using it any easier—it became much more difficult and much more painful when I’d skip my daily PT.
This isn’t so very different. Writing is just that: writing. You can’t have writer’s block when you’re actually writing! You may have other unresolved issues that make you want to avoid writing, but using writing to address the issues gives you a strategy for dealing with both. Writing will help you identify what’s wrong. Don’t let the concept of writer’s block deny you that opportunity, or alienate you from your own writing! You might not be able to write yourself out of every problem, but in the end, it’s practically impossible to solve writing problems without using writing as your central strategy.