• Forest for the Trees
  • THE FOREST FOR THE TREES is about writing, publishing and what makes writers tick. This blog is dedicated to the self loathing that afflicts most writers. A community of like-minded malcontents gather here. I post less frequently now, but hopefully with as much vitriol. Please join in! Gluttons for punishment can scroll through the archives.

    If I’ve learned one thing about writers, it’s this: we really are all alone. Thanks for reading. Love, Betsy

FAQ — Writer’s Block

A few writers have asked if I have any advice for writer’s block. I may make some enemies saying this, but writer’s block is something that totally bores me. I even hate the term, writer’s block. It sounds like one of the newfangled diagnoses  such as Oppositional Disorder to pathologize an ill behaved child.  In my experience, you’re not writing because you don’t know what to write about, are afraid of exposure, have no discipline, are ambivalent about your desire/ability to write, etc. These are not small things. They are very real. But as I’ve said before, the world isn’t asking you to write; so it certainly doesn’t care if you don’t.  Don’t lament the time you don’t write.

That’s the tough love. Some ideas to get the wheels turning: therapy (obviously), pick up the old diary and pen (pushing a pen is good for the soul), try The Artist’s Way, get a Hitachi Magic Wand, join a workshop, read, walk two miles in the morning followed by lemon tea with honey, and as I’ve said before: get dressed!

2 Responses

  1. Decades ago I required myself to get on the “Walk Two Miles, Lemon Tea, then Ass Time” Program. Or sometimes it was the “Lemon Tea, Ass Time, then Walk Two Miles” Program depending on the time of day and temperature outside the writer’s room. And who’s fooling whom? In the early years there had to be a fairly substantial goodie featuring sugar and dough to go along with that tea — the bribe I needed to sit myself down and write. But it worked. It took years of on-again, off-again, but it worked. Now, there’s no goodie. I don’t need one. The goodie is the writing itself. Even on a “blank” day. In fact, now it’s a struggle to make sure the walk gets in.

    Hope you find your routine–the one that associates the reaching for words with joy, that unlocks the flow.

  2. Mornings. Before I have the chance to reconsider.

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