The Writer's Bane strangles your imagination, chokes your determination, and stifles every ounce of your desire to write. When it hits me, I usually close the laptop, leave the story, and sometimes don't come back for weeks - or even want to. A severe case means certain death for your story.
What is it? It's best known as Writer's Block. That's a drastic understatement. Writer's Wall. Writer's Mountain. In every form, it has plagued authors for years, and will continue to do so - IF it remains unchecked.
It's not enough to climb over or walk around the Block. We, as writers, must explode it: with dynamite, a magic spell, your choice. As difficult as it may sound, there is a way to obtain imaginary dynamite that may even destroy a Mountain. It's called outlining.
Even a basic, bare-bones skeleton of an outline can help. A thorough, ten-page outline will definitely prepare you for whatever Mountain ranges lie ahead. Some people like to do both, with every level of detail in between. I'm trying this. The Snowflake Method seems very reliable based on what I've heard about it, and it seems just about in the middle of the above two extremes. I'm currently on Step 2 and I can't wait to see whether it has enough firepower to demolish the Wall. (On another note: the name of the method seems very appropriate based on the weather outside. Ugh.)
Now get out there and DESTROY!
~ Sophia-Rose
I learned this the hard way last NaNoWriMo. Spontaneous scene-crafting is always a tough thing for me, but I'm using roleplaying to ease the pain and test my imagination. At the moment, I have four pages of a plot (11-point font) and about ten pages of character "statistics", one and a half of them finished. (See, they're very detailed sheets. :P)
ReplyDeleteMy favorite wall-demolition method, hands down, is to release my pet kraken. He lives inside my file cabinet, which explains both the mess and the smell.