Writer's Block(s) Redux
May. 19th, 2021 07:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
swan_towerYears ago I wrote an essay for my site called "Writer's Block(s)," wherein I said I don't find the term "writer's block" to be helpful.
I stand by that, even though I've now gone through a period where, if I were inclined to use that term, that's what I would have called it.
In 2020 I was hugely productive. Some writers found it very difficult to write last year, but I was in the camp that took refuge from the world by escaping into ones of my own creation. I wrote two novels (The Liar's Knot with Alyc, and Night Parade on my own), plus ten short stories, three flash, one fanfic, one short story for L5R, various short adventures for Sea of Legends, and my ongoing Patreon essays.
Given that, it wasn't surprising that after I rounded the corner into 2021, things slacked off. I'd been working really hard, after all, and you can't do that nonstop forever. I'd already decided to slow my roll on short fiction because I was writing it faster than I could sell it, so taking a break from that wasn't a problem. Besides, I had The Mask of Mirrors out in January and Night Parade two weeks later, so there was a stretch of literal months where I was doing promotional events every week, usually two or three of them. That eats brain and energy and I know it, so giving myself time off from producing something new was good self-care.
But.
Round about late February, I realized my ability to brain creatively was not regenerating. I'd taken two months off and I still had no more energy for writing than I had before; if anything, I had less. I'd written my final L5R story and a couple of pieces of flash, but for the former I had the benefit of all the existing story momentum and the latter were . . . not impressive. More importantly, I had a story due to an anthology, and I was having the worst time getting it done.
Well, there could be multiple reasons for that. And I knew perfectly well that I had a plot problem in the story which I hadn't yet solved -- so naturally I couldn't move forward on it. I made myself sit down and I figured out a way around that problem, which let me write a little more . . . but then I ran into a new problem, which slammed me into a second wall.
And then I reached a point where even trying to make myself think about the problem induced a flinch reaction in my brain: god, no, please don't make me.
This was . . . not good.
If you saw the day in mid-March where I asked on Twitter for cute cat pics and the like, that was the day I realized I wasn't simply tired, and I wasn't simply stuck on a bit of plot and everything would be fine once I sorted that out. Something had gone wrong in my head, that merely sitting back and waiting wasn't going to fix.
But the gist of that original essay is that calling the issue "writer's block" accomplishes nothing. It's a description of symptoms, not a diagnosis of cause, much less a cure. I had to figure out why my head had gone wrong, on a global level that went well beyond being in a plot corner with a single story.
I mean, pandemic. That was a pretty obvious culprit. But "pandemic" wasn't really an answer, either, because there was a pandemic before and I still wrote, and also what exactly about the pandemic was the bit stabbed into my brain? There's been discussions about the lack of novelty involved in being locked down, which can be particularly deadly to creative work; that seemed like a good angle to investigate. My first-line response was to spend a whole day doing things like working on a jigsaw puzzle, playing piano, and otherwise engaging in activities I hadn't done in ages, which definitely helped to lift my immediate mood, even if it didn't fix everything.
What about environmental factors? I figured winter had something to do with it -- I've known for decades that I don't respond well to a lack of sunlight -- but merely rounding the corner into daylight saving time hadn't brought the improvement I hoped for, so I got more aggressive about seeking out light. We recently got a swing for our back patio, and the weather was nice enough for me to sit out there, so I started making a point of doing that every day (light + a new place to sit, i.e. novelty). In fact, the trainer I see has a list of elements that play into good health -- things like nutrition, sleep, and so forth -- and sunlight is on that list, so my "homework" from him for a while was not to lift weights or anything like that, but to get at least twenty minutes on the patio each day.
I also started taking a vitamin D supplement, on the theory that a deficiency in that nutrient has caused sluggishness in multiple people of my acquaintance, and overdosing on the stuff basically requires you to down a whole bottle in one go, so why not supplement for a while and see if that helped.
And that story I was stuck on? Well, I had a deadline, so I did have to push through, rather than just shelving it until I felt better. But I talked to Alyc, who not only helped me work out the problem I'd been stuck on, but made a suggestion for another detail that wound up fixing a problem I hadn't even gotten to yet. Which unclogged the brain ducts enough for me to get the story done, with a small extension from the editor that gave me time enough away to revise the draft as it needed. So yes, "fix the story" was part of the solution, along with other things. (Full disclosure: I held off on making this post until I heard back from the editor with revisions, because a part of me was afraid that I'd turned in something visibly sub-par. But he's delighted with it, so I feel much more comfortable publicly discussing the problems I had along the way.)
So here we are, roughly two months after I started trying to figure out what was off in my head and how to fix it. How are things going? Well, in April I finally rewrote a story I'd drafted in 2019 and had meant to redo ever since then (the idea was solid, but the execution was meh at best). And I also popped out a piece of flash I'm quite pleased with. And I started revising another story whose polishing I've been putting off. More pertinently, one evening recently I decided I'd done plenty of work during the day and sat down to read . . . only to wind up scribbling notes and even writing material for a side project I've got going on. In other words, I was excited enough about that project to spontaneously generate ideas for it when I wasn't trying to extract them.
That's what my brain looks like when it's working right.
Now, I will be the first in line to say that I'm lucky: this problem wound up being relatively quick to resolve. I do not appear to have developed major depressive disorder or anything else that would require medical intervention to fix. My home remedies sufficed, at least for now, and they sufficed in a fairly short time -- call it a few weeks before I started feeling like I was on my way out of the pit, and a bit over a month before I felt like I was back on my feet. Not everybody has that easy a time of it.
But I stand by what I said before. If I were to rewrite "Writer's Block(s)" today (which I may do), it would be to change the presentation of the points there, not the points themselves. I had to dig past the surface of "I'm having trouble writing" and even the surface of "well, pandemic" to get to the potential causes and the changes that might help mitigate them. My first attempted solution (taking time off) didn't work; okay, what should I try next? If it isn't just low-grade burnout, if it isn't all the promotional stuff taking my time and energy, then what is it? What path might get me back to where I want to be?
We have to ask ourselves these questions. Simply waiting and hoping the problem will go away on its own will only fix a minor subset of the possible causes; some of the others may get worse, as the failure to produce exacerbates the stress. Sometimes you need to crack the whip over your own head, and sometimes that will only drive you deeper into the hole. Sometimes you won't know what works and what doesn't until you try.
But you can try, and eventually -- hopefully -- find your way back out again.
(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/E1Yarp)
I stand by that, even though I've now gone through a period where, if I were inclined to use that term, that's what I would have called it.
In 2020 I was hugely productive. Some writers found it very difficult to write last year, but I was in the camp that took refuge from the world by escaping into ones of my own creation. I wrote two novels (The Liar's Knot with Alyc, and Night Parade on my own), plus ten short stories, three flash, one fanfic, one short story for L5R, various short adventures for Sea of Legends, and my ongoing Patreon essays.
Given that, it wasn't surprising that after I rounded the corner into 2021, things slacked off. I'd been working really hard, after all, and you can't do that nonstop forever. I'd already decided to slow my roll on short fiction because I was writing it faster than I could sell it, so taking a break from that wasn't a problem. Besides, I had The Mask of Mirrors out in January and Night Parade two weeks later, so there was a stretch of literal months where I was doing promotional events every week, usually two or three of them. That eats brain and energy and I know it, so giving myself time off from producing something new was good self-care.
But.
Round about late February, I realized my ability to brain creatively was not regenerating. I'd taken two months off and I still had no more energy for writing than I had before; if anything, I had less. I'd written my final L5R story and a couple of pieces of flash, but for the former I had the benefit of all the existing story momentum and the latter were . . . not impressive. More importantly, I had a story due to an anthology, and I was having the worst time getting it done.
Well, there could be multiple reasons for that. And I knew perfectly well that I had a plot problem in the story which I hadn't yet solved -- so naturally I couldn't move forward on it. I made myself sit down and I figured out a way around that problem, which let me write a little more . . . but then I ran into a new problem, which slammed me into a second wall.
And then I reached a point where even trying to make myself think about the problem induced a flinch reaction in my brain: god, no, please don't make me.
This was . . . not good.
If you saw the day in mid-March where I asked on Twitter for cute cat pics and the like, that was the day I realized I wasn't simply tired, and I wasn't simply stuck on a bit of plot and everything would be fine once I sorted that out. Something had gone wrong in my head, that merely sitting back and waiting wasn't going to fix.
But the gist of that original essay is that calling the issue "writer's block" accomplishes nothing. It's a description of symptoms, not a diagnosis of cause, much less a cure. I had to figure out why my head had gone wrong, on a global level that went well beyond being in a plot corner with a single story.
I mean, pandemic. That was a pretty obvious culprit. But "pandemic" wasn't really an answer, either, because there was a pandemic before and I still wrote, and also what exactly about the pandemic was the bit stabbed into my brain? There's been discussions about the lack of novelty involved in being locked down, which can be particularly deadly to creative work; that seemed like a good angle to investigate. My first-line response was to spend a whole day doing things like working on a jigsaw puzzle, playing piano, and otherwise engaging in activities I hadn't done in ages, which definitely helped to lift my immediate mood, even if it didn't fix everything.
What about environmental factors? I figured winter had something to do with it -- I've known for decades that I don't respond well to a lack of sunlight -- but merely rounding the corner into daylight saving time hadn't brought the improvement I hoped for, so I got more aggressive about seeking out light. We recently got a swing for our back patio, and the weather was nice enough for me to sit out there, so I started making a point of doing that every day (light + a new place to sit, i.e. novelty). In fact, the trainer I see has a list of elements that play into good health -- things like nutrition, sleep, and so forth -- and sunlight is on that list, so my "homework" from him for a while was not to lift weights or anything like that, but to get at least twenty minutes on the patio each day.
I also started taking a vitamin D supplement, on the theory that a deficiency in that nutrient has caused sluggishness in multiple people of my acquaintance, and overdosing on the stuff basically requires you to down a whole bottle in one go, so why not supplement for a while and see if that helped.
And that story I was stuck on? Well, I had a deadline, so I did have to push through, rather than just shelving it until I felt better. But I talked to Alyc, who not only helped me work out the problem I'd been stuck on, but made a suggestion for another detail that wound up fixing a problem I hadn't even gotten to yet. Which unclogged the brain ducts enough for me to get the story done, with a small extension from the editor that gave me time enough away to revise the draft as it needed. So yes, "fix the story" was part of the solution, along with other things. (Full disclosure: I held off on making this post until I heard back from the editor with revisions, because a part of me was afraid that I'd turned in something visibly sub-par. But he's delighted with it, so I feel much more comfortable publicly discussing the problems I had along the way.)
So here we are, roughly two months after I started trying to figure out what was off in my head and how to fix it. How are things going? Well, in April I finally rewrote a story I'd drafted in 2019 and had meant to redo ever since then (the idea was solid, but the execution was meh at best). And I also popped out a piece of flash I'm quite pleased with. And I started revising another story whose polishing I've been putting off. More pertinently, one evening recently I decided I'd done plenty of work during the day and sat down to read . . . only to wind up scribbling notes and even writing material for a side project I've got going on. In other words, I was excited enough about that project to spontaneously generate ideas for it when I wasn't trying to extract them.
That's what my brain looks like when it's working right.
Now, I will be the first in line to say that I'm lucky: this problem wound up being relatively quick to resolve. I do not appear to have developed major depressive disorder or anything else that would require medical intervention to fix. My home remedies sufficed, at least for now, and they sufficed in a fairly short time -- call it a few weeks before I started feeling like I was on my way out of the pit, and a bit over a month before I felt like I was back on my feet. Not everybody has that easy a time of it.
But I stand by what I said before. If I were to rewrite "Writer's Block(s)" today (which I may do), it would be to change the presentation of the points there, not the points themselves. I had to dig past the surface of "I'm having trouble writing" and even the surface of "well, pandemic" to get to the potential causes and the changes that might help mitigate them. My first attempted solution (taking time off) didn't work; okay, what should I try next? If it isn't just low-grade burnout, if it isn't all the promotional stuff taking my time and energy, then what is it? What path might get me back to where I want to be?
We have to ask ourselves these questions. Simply waiting and hoping the problem will go away on its own will only fix a minor subset of the possible causes; some of the others may get worse, as the failure to produce exacerbates the stress. Sometimes you need to crack the whip over your own head, and sometimes that will only drive you deeper into the hole. Sometimes you won't know what works and what doesn't until you try.
But you can try, and eventually -- hopefully -- find your way back out again.
(originally posted at Swan Tower: https://is.gd/E1Yarp)
no subject
Date: 2021-05-19 10:26 pm (UTC)I'm sorry you suffered from burnout and glad you came out of it.
I think what's most detrimental in all of these cases (I can think of more) is the conflation of a relatively mild, temporary expression that can be overcome with a little TLC (and rest, hydration, new strategies etc) and mental health issues that may need a whole lot more intervention (and general reduction of stress levels etc). I don't think we need to retire 'depression' or 'writer's block' from our vocabulary; I think we need to take them seriously and use other terms for non-serious expressions. I also think we need to catch the beginnings of these issues and take them seriously so they don't _become_ major problems.
Equally, people who suffer from the minor form need to have a better toolbox so they don't catastrophize ('I will never write again'/'there's nothing I can do'.)
no subject
Date: 2021-05-19 10:35 pm (UTC)And distinguishing both of those from issues within the story itself: plot went down the wrong path, insufficient development of a villain, or other stuff that just needs to be thought through, without any need for changes in the writer's life.
I don't think we need to retire 'depression' or 'writer's block' from our vocabulary; I think we need to take them seriously and use other terms for non-serious expressions.
Agreed on depression; I stand by not thinking "writer's block" is a useful phrase. If by that we mean burnout, then we should say burnout, because that is more specific. If it's self-doubt or discouragement from too many rejections/bad sales/etc., then call it that, and so on for other possible causes. Specificity matters: I thought my problem was burnout, but remedies that ought to have helped that failed to do so, which meant my problem was something else.
Edited to add: though of course even specificity isn't a perfect help, because we still may use terms differently. What one person calls "burnout" may not be what another person means by that phrase. Still and all, it gets us closer than one blanket term for many possible causes.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-19 11:07 pm (UTC)I've been having a similar-sounding slump, though for rather longer. I burned myself out rather badly a couple years ago, and haven't ever managed to properly recharge. And I think I'm at a point where I need to improve a specific craft-thing (which also ties into the burnout), but the resources I have access to are not the resources I need.
People say "well, pandemic", but this pre-dates the pandemic. I mean, the pandemic's not helping; you're absolutely right about the lack of novelty making hard to refill the well. But that's the icing on the slump-cake, not the flour.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-19 11:20 pm (UTC)I hear you about the icing on the slump-cake, though. It makes the problem worse, but it isn't the problem itself.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-20 01:47 am (UTC)The craft thing is... well, I call it plot, but what I mean by that does not appear to be what other people mean by it. ;-) It may be more like what you talk about above in being stuck on a particular bit of plot. I'll hit a point where I need a Thing for the story to move forward, and I'll often have a shape or a feel for the thing, or I'll have the things around it, but I can't get the thing itself.
(Let me see if this hypothetical example is at all helpful: Joe is out of milk. Joe goes to the store. The store is out of milk, so Joe goes to a different store. As Joe is trying to find the milk at the unfamiliar store, [Thing happens] and Joe is now involved in a plot to overthrow the Broccoli Growers Association of America. He thwarts the plot by [Thing], [Thing], and [Thing], and finally by recovering the chairman's pinky ring (which he knows about because of [Thing]).
What are the Things? I got nothin'. Actually, that's not true; I can tell you that the first Thing is that Joe finds an object tucked amongst the packages of frozen broccoli. I know that the object is small, dark, and non-porous. Also, there is a shadowy figure lurking at the end of the aisle who sees Joe find the object. But what the object is...??? I am entirely capable of getting hung up forever on something like this.)
Sometimes it's a small (but vital) thing, sometimes it's a large one: I ended up writing three-quarters of a novel without any idea who the bad guy was or what he'd done, and granted that was the question the MC had to answer too, but it meant I spent an awful lot of time faffing around to fill pages without getting into info I didn't have. It was miserable. (This is where the burnout ties in.)
I am way over on the intuitive end of the intuitive-vs-analytical range of process, so most of the time my back-brain sorts these things out for me. But when it doesn't, it really doesn't, and I don't have good tools to do it any other way. And I've been running into more and more such cases. I need better tools.
I think the resource I need is a bunch of very patient writer-friends who are at or above my level, with whom I can sit down in person and bash this out -- in person because "What you just said is absolutely true and correct, and not at all what I'm talking about. No, not that. Not that either." is a lot easier to convey in a non-antagonistic way in person. ;-) And while I do have writer-friends who meet most of those criteria, they're not nearby, which means we only see each other at cons when we're all running in seven different directions at once.
On recharging: Two of the things that often help me are going out with friends to a nice restaurant, and going to museums & such where I can look at pretty and/or interesting things. So, yeah, not lately. (Another thing that used to help a lot was hanging out with a particular social group; sadly, that group imploded, and building a replacement is an effort that has not yet paid off.) Listening to new music can help if it's something that really hits home, but of course that's hard to predict.
I suspect another thing that's contributing to the burnout is that the miserable-slog book mentioned above is done but not actually done; I did (eventually!) figure out the bad guy, and the book came out surprisingly well considering, but I didn't stick the landing on the ending... and it's still niggling at me. (There was another, smaller Thing I needed to make the ending I wanted work, and I couldn't figure out what it was. I pushed through to get the book done anyway, which felt like the only viable choice at the time, but may not have been the right choice.) Finishing a book and being satisfied with it would definitely be recharge-y.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-20 06:11 am (UTC)So, for example, I might know exactly what the Thing is, in general noun terms (it's a magic sword, it's a time machine, it's a mystery clue, it's a spaceship hidden in a warehouse, it's the office building where the climactic fight scene takes place). But I can struggle forever with a scene if I can't get the Image to come to me. I had one fight scene that I just recently got through - after beating my head against it for ages - when I realized that the problem wasn't any aspect of the fight itself (which I had blocked out in detail); it was that I was having trouble with the physical logistics of where it was staged (in a conference room in an office tower). And if I moved it to the street outside - all of a sudden I had much more to work with, it was easier to move people in and out of the scene, and most importantly I had a vivid image (rain pouring down, a smoking overturned fire truck, etc) that the scene was built around, whereas the conference room was a vague beige blur that was kind of an amalgam of different, similar places I've seen on TV or in real life. I couldn't really get a grasp on either the visuals or the mood to make the whole scene work.
It sounds like my problem is sort of yours in reverse, where it's relatively easier for me to just pin a noun on whatever Joe finds in the broccoli (it's a matchbook from the nightclub where his partner died!) but then I can get stuck for ages on nailing down the unique feel/concept/Image of the object and/or setting in order to make the whole scene click.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-20 03:23 pm (UTC)But I think I get what you mean. It sounds like the scene has to have some "life" to it for you, some personality intrinsic to the scene itself in addition to whatever you've got going on in it. That usually comes naturally for me, but I can think of one or two occasions where it hasn't, and yeah, nothing's getting written until that gets solved.
Do you have any tricks or methods for figuring out the Image, or do you just do the "bash head against wall until blood droplets form intelligible pattern" technique? ;-)
And thank you, because this helped clarify something that I need to include when I'm trying to explain my problem to people. I realize that when I say I need to know what the Thing is, I also need to know what it *means*. So, for example, if the Thing were the matchbook from the nightclub, what does the nightclub or Joe's partner have to do with broccoli? It needs to have connections, it needs to have resonance (to put it in my own particular parlance), or it's just not going to go anywhere. I've got a half-formed story idea where the first clue to the murder mystery is a blue vase. I know nothing about it except that it's a vase, it's blue, and it doesn't go with the decor in the victim's apartment. And I clearly won't be moving on with it until I know what it's about.
I should specify, in case anyone's still reading, that Thing is not always a specific physical object. Sometimes I'll have an opening I really like, with characters and dialogue and an interesting starting scenario, and just absolutely no idea at all of a plot. To me this feels like the same kind of problem, just broader.
no subject
Date: 2021-05-28 06:58 am (UTC)Mostly that one. XD Though just knowing that's the problem is often helpful; instead of a vague "why isn't this working" I can approach it from the perspective of trying to get some cool visuals or a general mood into the scene, trying on different things until something clicks. And talking to people about it can help too, just by giving me some new ideas to chew on.
no subject
Date: 2021-06-01 08:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-05-20 12:13 pm (UTC)Um. Except that writing is about the Martinieres all the time right now. Working on book six, have the notions for books seven and eight. My God. But blogging is difficult, writing nonfiction is difficult--though I did finally come up with a non-Martiniere notion that I'll probably turn into a Kindle Vella serial.
However, finding the energy to do anything like quilting or other art? Faugh. Spent the last few days at Yellowstone (fully vaxxed, husband is stir-crazy and wants to travel, I'm still freaking out about the HORDES of unmasked people--yes, it's outside but damn it there's SO MANY IDIOTS). I've been playing with pictures and thinking that there has to be a means with which I can share them with the outer world...oh hi, Instagram.
Sigh. Meanwhile, the writing about the Martinieres is some of the best work I've done, according to my editor, but I can't sell it worth a hoot (self-pub, yeah like this is gonna have any attractiveness to tradpub, like anything else I write. I'm so over the "love the concept, love your work...can't sell it" rejects that I get too damn often).
Frustrating as hell.