I hate to call it writer's block, but...

Trying not to be angsty, but lately I'm feeling really trapped. Like I'm going nowhere with my writing, and I can't seem to get into the proper headspace to work on Neverland. So I keep going back to Blood Promise and Until Morning, tweaking and tinkering in the hopes that something will spring out of that parched, barren wasteland of literary desolation.

... See, that's what I'm talking about. Literary desolation? It's like whatever I write comes out looking garbled and over-dramatic and cliched and ugh just altogether trying too hard.

It's just really frustrating when you want something so badly and you keep trying and trying and nothing seems to work. I can understand if it's just a bad day or two. But what if I can never feel that way about writing again? What else can I do?

Came across this little diary entry I scribbled in my notebook not too long ago, and it seems like I've been feeling this way for far too long.

Now you know how ugly my handwriting is when I'm upset, hmm. But if that's too illegible for you, here's a typeset version:


21 June 2014, 10pm:

I want to give up. It seems like everything I try is useless. But I hate having nothing to show for my efforts, if I give up now. Six years of trying to get published, and although I've published one book since, the dismal sales is demoralising. 

I know people keep saying to press on, to keep at it and one day I'll make it. But how many writers have died in obscurity, how many have had to give up their dream because the obstacles are too many and too impossible to scale? 

All those hours slaving away at a book; all that time spent editing, rewriting, querying; all those hundreds and hundreds of rejection letters. What are they all for? Maybe they are telling me something, one thing: that I'm just not good enough and that I should give up, stop wasting my time. I will never be good enough to join the ranks of the writing superstars - Laini Taylor, Sarah Dessen, Maggie Stiefvater... 

I hate that I'm even thinking of giving up, but maybe I have to. But how do you give up something that gives meaning to your life, without giving up on life itself?

I know, I know. I'm being over-dramatic and morose.

Kristen Lamb weighed in on writer's block in her recent blog post:

Creative people are a lot like tigers. We do a lot of what looks like laying around and warming our bellies in the sunshine. Yet, what we're really doing is powering up because, once we go after that first draft, those words can be more elusive than a gazelle that's doping.

Regular folks who clock in and clock out of jobs in cubicles are grazers. They do the same routine day after day. *munch, munch, munch*. I feel this is often why creative people feel so stifled in these environments. We're tigers stuffed in a non-tiger role.

Grazing. That's exactly what I'm doing. Day in, day out, munch munch munch on sad green grass. I need meat. I need a holiday. Ha!

I read somewhere that people listen to sad songs when they're feeling down in order to seek emotional validation, so here's me turning to Kodaline for some of that.

Sorry about the whining and wallowing. I'm just in a weird funk right now. I'm not usually this mopey, I promise!

Hope your week's going better than mine! :0)

The 7 types of writers

1. The Planner

The Planner outlines and details every chapter, every scene, every line before getting down to writing. Flash cards and Excel sheets are usually involved. It's pretty hardcore.

2. The Pantser

Panster, as in write by the seat of your pants. I.e. the opposite of the Plotter. Plan? What plan? They make it up as they go along. And somehow, it works for them.

3. The After-Hours Writer

Also known as the one responsible for the feverish mutterings in the middle of the night.

4. The Researcher

You know that half of what you've researched won't go into the book, but man does it take the pressure off writing the actual thing!

Also, everything counts as research. Including watching videos like this documentary on McBusted:

5. The Uninspired

Self-explanatory.

6. The Inspired

Well. Good for you. Exit that way, please.


7. The Desperate

Desperate are those who have spent weeks and months tearing apart everything they write because nothing seems to be good enough.


8. The Emotional

They react to everything they write ... or don't write.

Guess which one I am now? 

But I found this quote on Laini Taylor's blog that is somewhat encouraging:

"One reason people have artist's block is that they do not respect the law of dormancy in nature. Trees don't produce fruit all year long constantly. They have a point when they go dormant.
And when you are in a dormant period creatively, if you can arrange your life to do the technical tasks that don't take creativity, you are essentially preparing for the spring when it will all blossom again."

~ Marshall Vandruff


Leave it to Laini to offer a dose of optimism. I swear, that woman inhales sunshine for breakfast. (Although with that fabulous pink hair, can she be anything but happy?)

Hope you're having a more creative day than me!

head, meet desk

"Writing fiction is not "self- expression" or "therapy". Novels are for readers, and writing them means the crafty, patient, selfless construction of effects. I think of my novels as being something like fairground rides: my job is to strap the reader into their car at the start of chapter one, then trundle and whiz them through scenes and surprises, on a carefully planned route, and at a finely engineered pace." 

 ~ Sarah Waters

"If you want to write a novel, don't try to stare at it head-on. It is Gorgon: If you meet its gaze it will turn you to stone. Countless wonderful books get not written - a more intransigent state of affairs that not getting written, by far - this way. Instead, I recommend writing a book behind your own back. Frontload as much organization as you can - way more than you think necessary, certainly more than you want to - plan the whole thing out in detail. Characters, setting, story, in deep detail, so you have an overall arc, an outline of at least a short paragraph for each chapter, what'll happen in it, who's going to do what in it, and where you need to be by the chapter's end." 

 ~ China Mieville

1. Make your main character want something.
2. Make your main character do something.
3. The components of a novel that readers care about most are, in order: story, characters, theme, atmosphere/setting.
4. Remember that nobody agrees on what a beautiful prose style is and most readers either can't recognize "good writing" or don't value it that much.
5. A sense of humor couldn't hurt. 

~ Laura Miller

*

Things are slow going on the writing front. I can't, for the life of me, figure out what the hell I'm trying to say and how to link the aforementioned incomprehensible stuff with my characters and their damn issues. They just seem to be going in circles - around themselves, around each other - and the story plods on in waterlogged shoes.

Ugh. My brain is all clogged up like a stuffed nose jammed with tissue paper. The words won't come, and the thoughts cut themselves off halfway through formation. It's like grasping at the wispy tails of evil, elusive plot unicorns and the misty trails of story ideas. 

On days like this, there is pretty much only one thing left to do:

Sigh.