Note 186 – Preparing for writer’s block

Today’s suggestion for a writing topic comes from Noel Walker, founder of OpenLeaf and author of Get the Life you Want (Twitter @GTLYW).  The suggestion he tweeted was “what about something on the lines of writers block i.e. just start writing, anything & allow those inspired thoughts to come?”.

Thanks Noel.  I don’t recall ever having writer’s block as such, but just the thought of it makes me even more determined to prepare myself in case I do.  Sometimes I am not particularly in the mood for writing but then I do flow writing (see Note 132 Warming up before the real writing) and just write write write about anything in order to warm up.  Other times, I just write something down on a particular topic and eventually go back and edit it when I’m in the right frame of mind (see Note 182b Psychology of Writing (after clutter clearing).

On the website About.com Fiction Writing, Ginny Wiehardt writes about the Top 10 Tips for Overcoming Writer’s Block and makes a similar point: “Turn the critical brain off. There is a time and place for criticism: it’s called editing”.  She also suggests that it’s always helpful to write about subjects that you love as I mentioned in Note 185 – Writing about subjects you are passionate about.

If all else fails, try doing something else or just sit and think for a while.  Your thoughts might inspire you to write a masterpiece.

A lot of people have written about writer’s block – here are some related articles below:

• Writers Block (jandomagala.wordpress.com)
• A Writing A Day Makes A Writer’s Block Away (onredawk.wordpress.com)
• Writing Essays: How to Beat Writer’s Block (distance-education.org)
• Freelance Writer on writers block (writersshed.wordpress.com)
• WRITER’S BLOCK: Myth or Fact? (evasantiago.wordpress.com)

This blog post forms part of my writing challenge. Don’t forget that you can subscribe to receive my daily blogs by email so that you don’t miss any. Just click ‘sign me up’ on the home page. Alternatively you can follow my blogs on Twitter or my ‘Tips and Luxuries‘ Facebook page. Requests for future blogs (punctuation/grammar/writing tips) are always welcome.

Until tomorrow…

Sandra
Freelance writer
Please visit www.sandramadeira.com for more information on my services as a freelance writer.

My writing challenge

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Twitter: @madeirasandra @tipsandluxuries @OpenLeafJourney

Reference list:

Noel Walker OpenLeaf

Ginney Wiehardt  http://fictionwriting.about.com/od/writingroadblocks/tp/block.htm