A cure for writer’s block…500 Words
I have writer’s block this morning. I have four blog drafts sitting on my computer – all incomplete. I’ve got tons of unfinished copy for bulk emails that will never be sent because they suck. They SUCK! I’m not being melodramatic here. They suck.
It’s the ultimate feeling of creative, emotional impotence. It’s IMPOTENCE – I tell you. It’s not being able to get it up for your creative muse. And as she sits there – laughing at you – laughing at your inability to perform – you just want to go off into another room – maybe the kitchen – and ball your soul out because you couldn’t get it up for the hot chick you finally managed to get into your bedroom.
And it ends up being like dating. The more insecure you get – the more they smell it on you. Even if you get the courage to ask for that phone number – finally – they smell insecurity all over you and refuse you. REFUSE YOU – they do – because you stink of uncertainty. And who wants to fuck that? So you stop asking for the phone number.
Writing is a lot like dating. You need to be alright with failing. You need to be alright with attacking your typewriter or notepad or laptop and having it laugh at you. Because it will. It will laugh at you from time to time. It’s laughing at me RIGHT NOW because I’m the worst typist ever. EVER. Slow and sppoly. Spoply. Slppoy. Sloppy. That right there took me 5 minutes.
But you must write. Vomit. Purge. Or else it’s just a crazy notion in your head that does no one else any good. My mom always said, “Write it down or it doesn’t exist.”
There’s a reason all those pretentious twats call it a “craft.” (I’ve been known to be a pretentious twat – so take heed of what I say.) It’s something you work at. It has to be – or else all the less initiated posers would all get to broker huge book deals and make millions. There’s enough of that happening anyway. The creme may ultimately rise to the top – but making creme can be fucking hard!!
Hemingway was the one that said, “The first draft of anything is shit.” And he’s right! Dead right! Not because the ideas are sophomoric or uninteresting. Not because the characters are horrible mono-dimensional. Because when you shit -you let it all out – unformed. Spit it out and figure out what it all means next go round.
Graham Greene famously said that he wrote 500 words a day. Period. That’s it. If he was in the middle of a sentence and had reached 500 words – he’d be done. He’d get back to it the next day. If a sentence was unfinished – GREAT. He’d at least have the knowledge that he would know where SOMETHING was going when he sat down to write the following day. Inspired.
There’s a reason most writers wrestle with addictions – alcohol, drugs, sex…we’re just trying to stop ourselves over-thinking…
another point…
Saturdays In The Dark 