On Writer's Block
( originally posted by publiusfestus on 7/25/06)
I've been thinking of that post on readers_list, since linked to at least twice on the FL, on Writer's Block. I didn't get much out of it, although it had its moments. One thing that did set me going, though, was the commentary on performance anxiety. Two creative fields -- writing and acting -- are so proud of their "unique" performance anxieties that they've given them custom names (writer's block and stage fright, respectively). And yes, I do mean "proud." Writers get writer's block. If you get writer's block, you must be a writer (although I did get swimmer's ear from a shower once, not from swimming, and although I've had athlete's foot, I'm hardly an athlete).
It seems to me that I didn't get a lot out of that piece because writer's block isn't really one thing. It's just what writers call it when they can't do what they claim to want to do. Non-writers have different names for that, depending on why it is they're not doing: Performance anxiety, ennui, laziness, disinterest, stress, self-codependency, paralysis.... but "we writers" (for, since I get writer's block, I too am a writer) tidy it into a box and call it "writer's block."
One problem with calling it that is that it leads to people writing helpful pieces on how to cure the one illness. Get House, he's got a pill or a potion for everything. Sure, in the 40th minute, he's still not quite sure what's causing the patient to sink in and out of the coma while the legs go gangrene, but by the 45th, he'll discover it: Writer's Block! 50ccs of metatexalin, a cold compress, and after the Aflac commercial break the patient is right as rain.
Another problem with calling it that is that it gives the thing power. I'm not filled with ennui: I have Writer's Block. I'm not woefully insecure about my Mad Riting Skillz: I have Writer's Block. The word BLOCK -- in this case, it means a filter, an obstruction, like people with heart attacks. They get blockages. But a block is more than that: It's a boulder, something immovable. We're not slowed down, we're stuck, and it's just not going to go away. Not without 50cc of metatexalin. And a cold compress.
We do things because we want to, or because we perceive that we have to, or we feel an obligation to. If we can't write, it's either because we don't really want to, or because we feel some sort of resentment towards the act, or just because we're just plain not in the mood. Do people stare at their long-disused game consoles and think about "Playstation Block"? Not usually, no. Do people look at the weeds in their yard while they sip mint juleps and ponder "Yardwork Block"? Not in my experience.
I think we as a culture have come to assign something epic to the creative process in general, and to the writing process specifically. So much so, that if we can't perform it (either from lack of desire, lack of inspiration, or lack of ability) we can still deign to belong to the Company of Writers by claiming an ailment. O recalcitrant muses! Woe upon me! My fingers are poised upon the keyboard, but the beauty lingering in my psyche will not pour forth, honeyed mead upon my audience's eyes and ears!
The thing is, it doesn't get us writing to do so (irony flag: I'm writing quite a bit here). It also doesn't identify the source of the non-production. I've had different sources throughout my life; the major ones appear to be:
-- Laziness. Pure and simple. It's easier to sit around and moan about how uncreative I am than to write something. Writing something of quality takes a long time with minimal, if any, feedback. My process (more on that) involves writing a complete piece and THEN showing it to people -- that could take weeks, even months. Even *gasp* years. But a post about how I Can't Write? Minutes. Hoohah. And I know that there will be people who will sympathize with me. Because all of us Writers. We Know. Writer's Block! *tut* Damnable muses!
-- Anxiety. As a member of another elite -- the Misunderstood Hyperintelligent -- I suffer from the fear that nothing's good enough, that since things tend to come to me easily, I must be doing it wrong. People talk about overcoming writer's block by remembering that the first draft is always terrible. That's just not true for me. I have had some absolutely perfect pieces written in one draft. And so I wonder: Are they really not as good as I think? And, worse: What if I do need a second draft, am I losing my edge? What if it's utter crap, and I need to toss it out? See, in other ventures, people throw out losses all the time. Not every idea is a diamond, sometimes they're turds. Comedians have jokes fall flat. Only in football has a US pro sports team played an entire year without a single loss, and that's only happened two or three times. But: Writing == Epic. So loss == tragedy, an Austen heroine wandering hapless and forlorn on the moors.
-- Resentment. I stopped writing for a long time because it stopped being something I did for fun and psychological release and started being something I did with an eye towards making money. I don't like money. I wish we lived in a society where people were reasonable about sharing, where it was less about hoarding the taro roots and more about making sure everyone had their needs met. (No, I'm not socialist: I don't think the government should force this, I think people should do it because it's a decent thing to do. Although I suppose I'm a hypocrite there, too.) So since I resent money, I came to resent the task of writing.
-- Disinterest. I don't think we humans allow ourselves to shift enough. We tend to think in terms of Things We Do Now vs Things We Used to Do. Maybe I do that more than others, but I definitely plead guilty there. I used to read, I don't anymore. Toggle-thinking, though, can lead to thinking that switch, once thrown, has to stay in that position. Since I don't read anymore, if I try to start again, I'll fail. I'm an EX-Reader: The Tyrrany of EX. I've STOPPED. I cannot start again. It's a mental straitjacket, and like most mental straitjackets, it's something we put on ourselves.
-- Unreasonable "needs." Another straitjacket is the concept of Process: This is how we do things. This is how I write. If I deviate, then I will fail. If I show someone something I'm writing before I'm done, I will stop -- it's what I do. It's my PROCESS. I have to set up my writing environment just so. I have to have this type of music. No distractions -- Genius at work. I imagine the primadonna concert pianist, setting out the candelabra, adjust the coattails, stretching the fingers, because everything must be just so. For much of the audience, it's part of the act, but for much of the audience: Just play already! If I need twenty minutes to get "in the zone" before I can write a single, glistening literary jewel, and if any disturbance resets that timer, then I can blame an uncooperative clock and an uncooperative world for my lack of production.
But really, look. I just spent about forty minutes or so, grabbed at the office, interrupted by people coming in and out, no music, slouched in my chair -- and this post is fairly decent, I think.
So Writer's Block is, more than anything, an excuse. A bad one, at that -- too simple, too epic. No "real" Writer! (said with the same flair with which Jon Lovitz's character used to say "Actor!") would simply not be in the mood. Cross-stitch, Xbox, or do some writing? *Shrug* No, such dilemma are faced by hobbyists, hacks... writers suffer the debilitation of Writer's Block.
"Oh, but, Paul! I do want to write... I ache to write... my fingers tingle with desire as they hover on the keyboard! But nothing comes out."
Something will come out. Maybe it'll be crap. Maybe now's the time that your mind wants to write crap. Don't share it. You don't have to share everything, after all. You don't even have to re-read it. At one point, I have no doubt, there existed Shakespearean plays that were absolutely atrocious. Jezebel and the Courtiers, perhaps, a bible story and a romance, with enough comedy to sparkle Queen Elizabeth I's eyes, except on the first read-through in the privacy of his apartment, Bill realized it was Utter Crap and burned it.
And maybe what's hovering just beyond that crap is the (*Leslie Neilsen deadpan*) golden shower of wisdom that you want to release. Who knows? You won't, unless you let the crap fly.
One thing I'm still trying to get lodged into my own head is that an hour spent writing crap isn't an hour wasted. If I hadn't been writing crap, I might have been watching TV, I might have been doing solid chores, I might have been playing games, I might have been growing my career -- and, if you're like me, you just evaluated those tasks according to some perceived intrinsic worth.
But none of it is wasted if you use it to contribute to your identity as a person, and all of it is wasted if you don't. That's my opinion. People first: Tasks second. Because the tasks (as Sunday's Dilbert points out) will always be there.
Writing isn't any more epic than any other venture. We just treat it that way.
I've been thinking of that post on readers_list, since linked to at least twice on the FL, on Writer's Block. I didn't get much out of it, although it had its moments. One thing that did set me going, though, was the commentary on performance anxiety. Two creative fields -- writing and acting -- are so proud of their "unique" performance anxieties that they've given them custom names (writer's block and stage fright, respectively). And yes, I do mean "proud." Writers get writer's block. If you get writer's block, you must be a writer (although I did get swimmer's ear from a shower once, not from swimming, and although I've had athlete's foot, I'm hardly an athlete).
It seems to me that I didn't get a lot out of that piece because writer's block isn't really one thing. It's just what writers call it when they can't do what they claim to want to do. Non-writers have different names for that, depending on why it is they're not doing: Performance anxiety, ennui, laziness, disinterest, stress, self-codependency, paralysis.... but "we writers" (for, since I get writer's block, I too am a writer) tidy it into a box and call it "writer's block."
One problem with calling it that is that it leads to people writing helpful pieces on how to cure the one illness. Get House, he's got a pill or a potion for everything. Sure, in the 40th minute, he's still not quite sure what's causing the patient to sink in and out of the coma while the legs go gangrene, but by the 45th, he'll discover it: Writer's Block! 50ccs of metatexalin, a cold compress, and after the Aflac commercial break the patient is right as rain.
Another problem with calling it that is that it gives the thing power. I'm not filled with ennui: I have Writer's Block. I'm not woefully insecure about my Mad Riting Skillz: I have Writer's Block. The word BLOCK -- in this case, it means a filter, an obstruction, like people with heart attacks. They get blockages. But a block is more than that: It's a boulder, something immovable. We're not slowed down, we're stuck, and it's just not going to go away. Not without 50cc of metatexalin. And a cold compress.
We do things because we want to, or because we perceive that we have to, or we feel an obligation to. If we can't write, it's either because we don't really want to, or because we feel some sort of resentment towards the act, or just because we're just plain not in the mood. Do people stare at their long-disused game consoles and think about "Playstation Block"? Not usually, no. Do people look at the weeds in their yard while they sip mint juleps and ponder "Yardwork Block"? Not in my experience.
I think we as a culture have come to assign something epic to the creative process in general, and to the writing process specifically. So much so, that if we can't perform it (either from lack of desire, lack of inspiration, or lack of ability) we can still deign to belong to the Company of Writers by claiming an ailment. O recalcitrant muses! Woe upon me! My fingers are poised upon the keyboard, but the beauty lingering in my psyche will not pour forth, honeyed mead upon my audience's eyes and ears!
The thing is, it doesn't get us writing to do so (irony flag: I'm writing quite a bit here). It also doesn't identify the source of the non-production. I've had different sources throughout my life; the major ones appear to be:
-- Laziness. Pure and simple. It's easier to sit around and moan about how uncreative I am than to write something. Writing something of quality takes a long time with minimal, if any, feedback. My process (more on that) involves writing a complete piece and THEN showing it to people -- that could take weeks, even months. Even *gasp* years. But a post about how I Can't Write? Minutes. Hoohah. And I know that there will be people who will sympathize with me. Because all of us Writers. We Know. Writer's Block! *tut* Damnable muses!
-- Anxiety. As a member of another elite -- the Misunderstood Hyperintelligent -- I suffer from the fear that nothing's good enough, that since things tend to come to me easily, I must be doing it wrong. People talk about overcoming writer's block by remembering that the first draft is always terrible. That's just not true for me. I have had some absolutely perfect pieces written in one draft. And so I wonder: Are they really not as good as I think? And, worse: What if I do need a second draft, am I losing my edge? What if it's utter crap, and I need to toss it out? See, in other ventures, people throw out losses all the time. Not every idea is a diamond, sometimes they're turds. Comedians have jokes fall flat. Only in football has a US pro sports team played an entire year without a single loss, and that's only happened two or three times. But: Writing == Epic. So loss == tragedy, an Austen heroine wandering hapless and forlorn on the moors.
-- Resentment. I stopped writing for a long time because it stopped being something I did for fun and psychological release and started being something I did with an eye towards making money. I don't like money. I wish we lived in a society where people were reasonable about sharing, where it was less about hoarding the taro roots and more about making sure everyone had their needs met. (No, I'm not socialist: I don't think the government should force this, I think people should do it because it's a decent thing to do. Although I suppose I'm a hypocrite there, too.) So since I resent money, I came to resent the task of writing.
-- Disinterest. I don't think we humans allow ourselves to shift enough. We tend to think in terms of Things We Do Now vs Things We Used to Do. Maybe I do that more than others, but I definitely plead guilty there. I used to read, I don't anymore. Toggle-thinking, though, can lead to thinking that switch, once thrown, has to stay in that position. Since I don't read anymore, if I try to start again, I'll fail. I'm an EX-Reader: The Tyrrany of EX. I've STOPPED. I cannot start again. It's a mental straitjacket, and like most mental straitjackets, it's something we put on ourselves.
-- Unreasonable "needs." Another straitjacket is the concept of Process: This is how we do things. This is how I write. If I deviate, then I will fail. If I show someone something I'm writing before I'm done, I will stop -- it's what I do. It's my PROCESS. I have to set up my writing environment just so. I have to have this type of music. No distractions -- Genius at work. I imagine the primadonna concert pianist, setting out the candelabra, adjust the coattails, stretching the fingers, because everything must be just so. For much of the audience, it's part of the act, but for much of the audience: Just play already! If I need twenty minutes to get "in the zone" before I can write a single, glistening literary jewel, and if any disturbance resets that timer, then I can blame an uncooperative clock and an uncooperative world for my lack of production.
But really, look. I just spent about forty minutes or so, grabbed at the office, interrupted by people coming in and out, no music, slouched in my chair -- and this post is fairly decent, I think.
So Writer's Block is, more than anything, an excuse. A bad one, at that -- too simple, too epic. No "real" Writer! (said with the same flair with which Jon Lovitz's character used to say "Actor!") would simply not be in the mood. Cross-stitch, Xbox, or do some writing? *Shrug* No, such dilemma are faced by hobbyists, hacks... writers suffer the debilitation of Writer's Block.
"Oh, but, Paul! I do want to write... I ache to write... my fingers tingle with desire as they hover on the keyboard! But nothing comes out."
Something will come out. Maybe it'll be crap. Maybe now's the time that your mind wants to write crap. Don't share it. You don't have to share everything, after all. You don't even have to re-read it. At one point, I have no doubt, there existed Shakespearean plays that were absolutely atrocious. Jezebel and the Courtiers, perhaps, a bible story and a romance, with enough comedy to sparkle Queen Elizabeth I's eyes, except on the first read-through in the privacy of his apartment, Bill realized it was Utter Crap and burned it.
And maybe what's hovering just beyond that crap is the (*Leslie Neilsen deadpan*) golden shower of wisdom that you want to release. Who knows? You won't, unless you let the crap fly.
One thing I'm still trying to get lodged into my own head is that an hour spent writing crap isn't an hour wasted. If I hadn't been writing crap, I might have been watching TV, I might have been doing solid chores, I might have been playing games, I might have been growing my career -- and, if you're like me, you just evaluated those tasks according to some perceived intrinsic worth.
But none of it is wasted if you use it to contribute to your identity as a person, and all of it is wasted if you don't. That's my opinion. People first: Tasks second. Because the tasks (as Sunday's Dilbert points out) will always be there.
Writing isn't any more epic than any other venture. We just treat it that way.