I know that I’ve written before about bolstering our creativity by keeping open minds concerning the direction our stories, characters, and plots can take. But in a world that can sometimes feel like a dark cloud over new ideas I think it’s important to revisit the power of a positive “What If?” in the way we approach our roadblocks.
We’ve all been in the middle of a down time in our writing and creativity. I know there are people out there that will preach that writer’s block does not really exist and you’re just procrastinating, or not wanting to put the work in.
While it is true that you’ll never write anything if you don’t actually sit down and write, trying to pour out a story (whether its 500 words or 100,000) from an overloaded, overworked, and over stimulated brain can be like trying to jam a king-sized sleeping bag into a twin sized sack. You know what I’m talking about.
There’s not enough room.
Some of the blocks taking up space may include fear (of failure and/or success), self-doubt, and perfectionism. These show up like the ghost in a Scooby Doo episode, unmasked to reveal depression, anxiety, imposter syndrome, and even ADHD.
So you’ll never hear me say that writer’s block doesn’t exist (and if I have claimed that before, I retract it). I believe that the inability to create can have very real sources that we sometimes need a dynamic team of teenage detectives in an ugly van to suss out.
Today, I’d like you to apply the two-word question to those moments of stifled creativity and see what happens.
Here’s an example:
“I have a novel, nearly complete, but you can’t figure out how to end it. It’s been on my laptop for a month and it’s driving me insane but every scenario in my head doesn’t ‘feel’ quite right, so I’m just not writing any ending at all.”
Why, that’s not a werewolf! It’s that dirty landowner PERFECTIONISM (who runs a floating crap game called FEAR).
By asking ourselves what we’re really afraid of, what’s really so hard about the situation (I don’t want to write the WRONG ending, none of the endings are GOOD ENOUGH) we can face the fear directly and start asking what if….
What if you took one hour each day to write three separate endings, for each of the different possibilities you have? Unattached to the novel, a separate document. Call it exploratory research. I would bet dimes to dollars that you’ll find one that is the BEST for your novel, and feel much more capable of completing the next project on deck.
Here’s another one.
“I haven’t written any new poems in over a week, I don’t feel creative, I don’t have any ideas. I can’t find the RIGHT words. I have submissions due, I can’t focus, and I can’t even remember how to write a good poem. I’m not a poet.”
Say, that’s not a two headed mummy! It’s the motel owner’s shady uncle ANXIETY and his henchman DEPRESSION. Your brain is overworked and can’t focus, you feel like there’s nothing new in the world to write about, or worth writing about. With a trace of PERFECTIONISM, and a dash of IMPOSTER SYNDROME, this combination puts an end to possibilities before they can even reach your brain.
What if you spent ten minutes outside? Find a tree, flowering bush, cloud, roly-poly, something not man made, and focus on it for ten solid breaths in and out. Don’t look at anything else, don’t think about anything else, don’t draw your attention away from that one object. How does it move, how is the light hitting it, how long has it been there, what color is it, does it smell, does it have a taste, what’s it made of?
Not only will being outside and remembering to breathe help you to relax and curb some of those anxious and depressive feelings, but you’ll realign yourself with the beauty of noticing the small things. And details bring poetry to life. Then sit down, in the grass, and write something, no more than a page, about what you felt, what you saw, what you took in through all of those sentences. Repeat, with anything. Human, animal, mineral, place, time, concept. The possibilities are endless.
Last one, best one.
“I can’t write a synopsis! It’s so detailed and I can’t possibly boil down my entire novel into a few pages. I wouldn’t know where to start, and what’s the point, no one will take my novel anyway!”
Oh, my little defeatist, that’s not a man-eating robot, why it’s nothing but the cranky heiress SELF-DOUBT dressed up in a spray painted, cardboard box!
Look, not every writer is birthed knowing how to write a synopsis. In fact, absolutely none of them are (I think they are, however, birthed with an extra gene carrying the appreciation of ‘old-book’ smell and a tendency towards adverb-overuse and caffeine addictions) We all had to research it, take a class on it, and put in the work including probably a dozen revisions along the way.
You can find a great resource for how to write one here:
https://blog.reedsy.com/how-to-write-a-synopsis/
If you’re an plotter, a synopsis is easier. You have it all typed up somewhere, so work off your outline and put aside a time-specific block to work on it and only it. If you’re a pantster, may God have mercy on your immortally, unorganized soul, because it is fucking hard to do. Same thing though, set aside an afternoon (or two) with a start and end time and write it out like you would a copy of Cliff Notes
Add something enjoyable to the completion (extra coffee or old books?) to make the goal a little sweeter to reach. Have someone who doesn’t know your book read the synopsis (yes, it should give away the ending, no, don’t worry if Janet in Accounting knows how it ends). They can let you know if it’s easy to follow without being overwhelming.
Self-doubt, fear, perfectionism, anxiety and depression are not final resting places for your writing (or other creative endeavors). They’re road blocks brought on by your own expectation and unrealistic standards. The best advice I can give you about “What If” is to ask yourself, in the face of rejection, frustration, and doubt…
What if you can? What if you can write that book? What if you could write three poems in an hour? What if you can send your pitch, synopsis, and novel out by the end of the week?
What If, when used properly, can be the precursor to hope.
So give yourself hope. Give yourself a choose-your-own-adventure. Give yourself a good what iffing.
That got weird. You know what I mean.
Found when they find me i will be alone the questions and headshakes directed in quizzical depths to the loam and silt they cannot sort through no reasoning to be caught in bucket or screen when they find me dressed as animals are in the skin i was in the day i roared into the plain i will shock in cold white filled with trout breath and minnow kisses When they find me broken shell battered lovely in purple and blue head struck rock knee scraped branches lips in shades to make mountain bluebell envious they will lament such wasted splendor when they find me the questions of why i was lost to the brine a jointer to the self-takers before me whispers will static the air of all the ways i failed and too long loitered in futility when they find me they will burn the empty package while I sneak, soul-snake in water down river bends to the sea never to be found again This Isn't a Poem for You So this isn’t a poem for the broken hearted it is not for those who were left behind or ghosted or dumped or abused or disregarded This is a poem for those who watched as another soul walked away sat in their silence was released from another person’s life faced pain at their hands or were simply ignored into nothingness… You are the warriors of time you, who have felt the sting of heart break and disappointments you are the carriers of grief and the bodies made of scars and you have lived through every burning cut and every lonely night This is not for the soul they broke, this is for the you that survived. This is not a sermon from some high tower that you are stronger for it that you are braver because of it that you are a better person a heart bigger, with these new and ragged cracks to let the light in I will only tell you what I know You survived. you packed up your heart and your mind and you moved on you accepted their silence you treated your wounds and closed the door you started paying attention to yourself when they no longer did and that carries weight self determination and the ability to move past the fickle and soft-seated lies, of a love always perched to flee the very second things got hard Your feet remain grounded and you outlasted You heart is a seasoned warrior and it may never let another in but it doesn’t have space anyway because in their absence beyond the echoes of their abuse the pain of their mistreatment, you’ve filled your heart with the unfaltering love of yourself they can’t ever move back in there isn’t room any more.
Sarah Reichert Author 