The 3 Types of Writer’s Block | My Recipe to MML

How do you break writer’s block? It’s different for everyone I think. But for me, it comes down diagnosing the type of writer’s block I’ve got.

For me, there are three types of writer’s block.

Block#1 is when I have no clue what to write about. A lack of inspiration. And it’s quite easy to solve this. The tiniest movement, a small description of a setting, any sights and sounds, maybe one or two dialogues. Literally anything is enough to inspire. But you have to be inspired. You can’t just sit at a laptop and stare at it.

Just as much, you can’t not force yourself to just sit down and write even if you’re worried you’re blocked. Because more often than not, and this is Block #2, it’s not a lack of inspiration, it’s a lack of motivation. You can never be worried you won’t have enough to say. Because:

Depending on the purpose, they just have to pick and choose which ones to tell.

And then there’s Block#3: You know exactly what you want to say. You have the entire movie planned out in your head. But the page just won’t take it. This is what I tend to face the most. Because I am a Type A person and especially when I’m writing from experience, it’s difficult to let the characters take charge of their stories.

I believe this is why Hemingway said one shouldn’t think of one’s writing when one is not writing the specific story they are thinking of.

Because you’ll have a great idea and you’ll really only that idea to take form. But as you write, you might encounter the conflict of your story going in a different direction. And it might be a thousand times better than your direction, but you have trouble letting go.

And that is why you must “kill all your angels” (“angels” are a metaphor for your most favorite features of a piece of writing that aren’t necessarily doing anything for it. Please don’t go murdering anyone, thank you.) I forget who said it, but some writer said it. I learned about it in poetry class this semester. I tried Googling it but did not remotely find what I was looking for. I’ll consult the notes upon my final poetry project later. My prof wrote this quote in the comments when I refused to edit a poem because I loved it too much. (Actually that’s another story I wanna tell some time).

In any case, Block#3 is what a lot of the novels I’m currently working on are suffering from.

But sometimes, when it comes to this blog, it’s Block#1. Which is why a lot of times, I tend to just start typing and see what happens. Especially when I’m racing against the clock to get at least 50 views a day for the rest of December so that my Dec 2021 View Count is at least 1 higher than my Nov 2021 View Count.