Writers block

Then again, I think stress blocks me badly, and there's been a lot of stress for me lately.

billy liar to thread, for starters. and horace OTM with 'muscle' idea.

But the idea of writing anything, however stupid, wouldn't work... because some days I think everything I've ever written is stupid. Very little confidence.

I'm not sure where the urge to be creative comes from, really. I wonder if it's a delusion. (BTW, there is one sample of writing on my Web site which I'd be interested in feedback on -- good or bad -- if anyone ever finds they have nothing better to do.) My feeling changes daily. Today I think: mediocre hack with no inspiration.

The stupid thing, though... [getting incoherent now]... what I mean is, well, my eyes get to see it. And I think those are the most damning eyes that see anything I do.

I suppose writing blog nonsense also counts, though. I guess in these ways I write a reasonable amount, but nothing that amounts to anything very useful. God, I'm so tortured and anal.

more funny than necessarily useful, really

But NaNoWriMo only comes once a year! I failed last time and am ready to try again, but I have to wait half a year.

- read a book and if I see a nice phrase: steal it: write it down on a pad: poetry is best for this.

- read music reviews and if I see a nice trope: steal it: most recent example of this: Mark's really old "Yello" article, I rewrote it with Barbara Morgenstern allied with Julia Volkova (for Bang, haha)

- sit and write, write, write; then edit. You should edit to like a tenth of what you originally wrote if you're being cruel to yourself.

- review something you currently can't get out of your head by trying to understand what it is has it lodged in there: this solves the problem of having to come up with ideas (eg "is rock the paradigm form of popular music?") and gives you an immediate angle

These are what I do. If they don't work, play Pro Ev 2.

* Take a shower. I associate taking a shower with waking up in the morning, so it's this whole like fresh-start bit. Especially if I brew coffee while I'm in the shower.

* Don't eat. I don't mean "ever" or "for days on end" or anything, but I find that I am less inclined to write, and to write well, if I'm full, and that if I'm at least a little bit hungry, I stay more focused. When I was finishing up my last novel, I got up, showered, worked, and didn't eat anything until I had at least 1500 words.

* Erase the last paragraph I wrote and start over from there -- make something different happen this time.

That's stuff I do when I'm blocked on something in-progress, though -- it's been a long time since I've had "I have no idea what to write about" writer's block. When I'm looking for a new idea, though, I pick up a book from one of the shelves or boxes, ask, "Okay, what could I write that would appeal to someone who likes this?" and continue that process until I like the answer (I write fiction, though).

Writing-other-things-to-get-rid-of-block -- blog/journal, email, letter, whatever -- has never once worked for me, and the bulk of the people I know who tried it ended up abandoning whatever sort of writing they were originally trying to unblock (fiction, usually) in favor of whatever the new thing was.

Well, the first thing you need to do is get over the idea that what you write on ILx isn't "writing."

For me, the block is basically against doing anything that will cause me to cut a figure in the world, that will hold me up to judgment - also, I've a fear of blowing it, that something that was beautiful in my mind will look like shit on the page. I had the idea for my "Death Rock 2000" piece in 1981, based on thoughts that had their germ in 1970. So that's not bad, only 30 years to write an article.

Every morning I write three pages of whatever's on my mind - I mean, whatever, just trying to get it down on the page, the equivalent of the "Print Screen" button on the computer, withoug worrying about spelling or finishing sentences. Then I usually rip the thing up. The point isn't to produce literature but to reestablish that the page is my home, my page, not anyone else's, and it can bear any garbage that happens to be in my mind.

That was an honest-to-god typo. I swear.

but, yeah, give yourself incentives. I don't smoke indoors, so I give myself a target word count to achieve before I step outside again.

Oh god, that depresses me. I've had a blog for a few years now and I'd never abandon fiction over something so dumb (sorry bloggers).

I think the reason for it is "with blogging, I get instant feedback" (most of the "bloggers" I know are actually LiveJournallers, and feedback is pretty quick and easy and common). Also, it is maybe easier to live with a constant feed of "Gosh, your journal is so well-written, I'll bet you'd write great stories!" than actually writing those stories.

Of course, all of my stuff is just "This does/doesn't work for me, who knows what it'll do for you." Curing writer's block is like curing insomnia in a world without sleeping pills: everyone's got a remedy, most of which won't harm you for the trying.