I didn't think this would happen, but I think I'm suffering from writer's block. How very trite of me!
Usually, I can put my fingers on a keyboard and out it comes. I don't know where it comes from, but the flow is there and I'm the conduit. Lately, it's like pulling hen's teeth. I'm trying to finish my NaNo book from last November, and it's already at about 65,000 words, but I've come to a dead standstill. As a matter of fact, I threw out the last chapter I wrote, with nothing to replace it. That's a little like quitting a job before you have another one.
I've always been fascinated by the "creative process" --- an overused phrase if ever there was one. I eagerly listen to interviews with authors and read writers' blogs or articles to see how they do it. Not surprisingly, they all have their own ways, just as I do. They talk about how it varies, about often having to simply get started, even when the muse seems to have gone AWOL. They also talk about being in the flow, feeling the creative high, watching it happen as if someone else were doing it. All of those things happen to me as well. The thing is, when I'm in a block ---- or perhaps I should say a fallow period ----- I am fearful that it's all dried up and will never come again. I'm struck dumb.
Now I know that's not true. It never has been yet, and actually, I have a very exciting idea on the back burner, bubbling away and trying not to scorch before I can get to it. It's my own sense of order that says I need to finish what I'm working on first. Step one. Step two. Step three. Don't put the cart before the horse.
So instead, what do I do? Hang out clothes, sweep floors, browse recipes, waste time on facebook. I text my daughter and call a friend. I zone out and take a stealth nap. None of that brings me any closer to finishing the task at hand.
One writer in an interview said he? she? sets a timer for an hour and sits at the computer, whether or not anything happens. That sounds too much like being forced to sit at the table until ALL that dinner was eaten, especially the vegetables. I can still feel the misery and hopelessness of that scenario!
Almost 40 years ago I had a car that had trouble starting on a regular basis. This was one of a string of cars I owned that I bought for $150 or less. In order to start this car, I had to remove the air filter and pour gasoline into the carburetor, then fire the engine. It usually worked. Once it caught fire and I poured baking soda into it to put out the fire, but that's another story.
This blog post is the gasoline. I'm hoping it will get things moving without starting too big a fire. I've got baking soda standing by.
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