The Truth About Writer's Block

A blocked writer is a frustrated writer

Source: lukasbieri/Pixabay

A persistent inability to write is a common problem, and one that bedevils students, journalists, and others who must produce content, frequently on a deadline. This condition, often referred to as “writer’s block,” is an umbrella term for what is most likely a diverse collection of more specific issues.

As a term, writer’s block is problematic because it suggests that the underlying problem is some sort of obstructed creative flow.

In many cases, however, the real issue may lie elsewhere. And it has much in common with a concept like cancer, another catch-all term for a number of distinct maladies that require different forms of diagnosis and treatment.

So instead of thinking about writer’s block as some monolithic entity, let’s break it down into its components. What are the real culprits?

Perfectionism

We all want our prose to sing, but it rarely does so in a first draft—or in a second or a third, for that matter. And it’s all too easy to get sucked into tinkering with the mechanics of a particular sentence instead of getting on with the business of stringing one’s thoughts together.

Laura Vanderkam, the doyen of time management, was interviewed about her successful writing career for The Atlantic. She suggested that the key to productivity is to “write fast, edit slow”—the exact opposite of what most people do. As Vanderkam observed, “It’s so much easier to turn something into something better than to turn nothing into something.”

Lack of confidence

Many published authors have trouble producing a second work if their first effort was reasonably successful. Once a writer has made a name for themselves, they often come to fear the hostile reception that a follow-up might engender. Sometimes called “sophomore slump” or “evaluation apprehension,” such fears can be debilitating.

Novice authors, on the other hand, may fear writing because they don’t think they know enough about their topic. This belief, however, is a trap. You could always read another article, or another book, or simply wait for inspiration to strike.

Joseph Conrad once remarked that writing is like “throwing mud at a wall”: some of it will stick, and some of it won’t. Your task is to start flinging words at the page without caring what other people think. In other words, don’t just sit there—write something!

Procrastination

If you’ve ever found yourself cleaning bathroom grout or dusting a ceiling fan instead of writing, then you know there are times when you would rather do anything except corralling ideas and putting them into some sort of order. A friend once confided to me that her apartment was never as clean as it had been while she was working on her doctoral thesis.

One way of dealing with procrastination is to join a writer’s group. It forces the reluctant author to commit to some sort of productivity schedule, and a little bit of peer pressure can go a long way in making forward progress on an assignment, article, or book.

Lack of ideas

Can’t think of what you want to say? You could seek inspiration from an online search or a chatbot. Try entering some text on your topic and see what pops out. This may provide the seed of an idea from which an assignment or an essay might flower, or you may encounter something that you strongly disagree with. In either case, you’ll have a starting point, and getting started is often more than half the battle when it comes to writing.

Distractions

In a world in which we carry pocket-sized devices that provide a portal to almost endless entertainment, putting off writing in favor of amusement has never been easier.

This isn't a new problem, however, and successful writers have found a variety of ways to deal with the scourge of distraction. Victor Hugo, for example, was apparently something of a party animal: He loved spending time socializing. But in the fall of 1830, when he found himself under the gun to complete The Hunchback of Notre Dame, he is said to have locked away his formal clothes so that he couldn’t go out and see his friends. Instead, he stayed at his desk, wearing a long gray shawl—and completed the novel by his publisher’s deadline.

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Johnathan Franzen, in a 2010 interview with Time magazine, also admitted to taking drastic action. The author of The Corrections and Freedom reported that he wrote in a spartan office, which he rented for that purpose, as well as took steps to cut himself off from the outside world. To avoid online temptation, Franzen went so far as to disable his laptop’s Ethernet port with superglue.

You don’t have to lock up your clothing or damage your laptop, but it can be very helpful to turn your computer into a glorified typewriter, capable of doing just one thing. Many word processors and operating systems have a “focus mode” that allows the user to focus on writing. Silence your phone, banish alerts, kill your email program—and write.