As a pediatric intern, the term “writer’s block” was missing from my lexicon…
The brick San Francisco hospital where I served my apprenticeship huddled in a swale. Down the street the old synagogue Jim Jones had rented as “Peoples’ Temple” before heading off to Guyana bellied up to the sidewalk. A few months after starting my internship in 1978, Jones would orchestrate the Jonestown Massacre. Distraught grandparents soon appeared at our clinic, seeking dental records for their lost kin. Nine days after the Jonestown mass suicide and murders, on November 27, San Francisco’s mayor, George Moscone, and Supervisor Harvey Milk were assassinated. Amid the chaos, medical care at the hospital soldiered on, following centuries-old patterns of care. Like our professional forebears, good medicine mandated written recounting of our patients’ medical history, descriptions of their condition, and plans for treatment. These handwritten records were the backbone of coordinating patients’ care, shared with professionals from nurses to respiratory therapists to social workers. My fellow physicians and I wrote them immediately and without fail.
Thirty years later I came to know writing skills as the “coin of the realm” in the world of public health leadership. Handouts for parents when viral meningitis circulated in the community had to be understandable but just as importantly, timely. Even the grade school principal would pitch in with other staff, photocopying them and racing to get them into the kids’ backpacks before bus time. Likewise, information about a bioterrorism threat needed for the Governor’s press conference would not wait on a muse to appear. Ever.
Now, I no longer practice medicine but, in a nod to my humanities college studies, have turned to writing. Although I might stumble along my prose path at times, I don’t get stymied. Here are ideas and information I’ve found helpful to keep the words flowing:
Set measurable goals
Figure out how much time you want to devote to writing. Full time? Or twenty hours a week? An hour a day? Whatever you choose, track your time honestly. I use the Pomodoro Technique to avoid frittering away time — only I use fifty- minute increments.
Define writing-related activities worthy of your time
Think broadly. Include research, ongoing skill acquisition, invoicing (if you are a professional). Develop a variety of writing projects — everything from that great novel to flash fiction to entries in competitions. Then, if you hit a stone wall writing, swing to your list of other activities and switch tasks. Creativity ebbs and flows — use the ebbs to work on the routine.
Develop a network of fellow writers
Writing may seem to be a solitary activity, but it flourishes with support. When you are running dry, have a colleague read your material and make suggestions. Even their bad ideas can spur you on to positive action. Read their work. Learn from their successes and failures.
Understand high performance requires sleep, exercise and healthy food.
Athletes know this. Writers need to as well. Writing, after all, is a brain activity. It follows that if you take care of your brain, your brain will do right by you. Researchers have found creativity and problem solving are enhanced after a period of sleep, even a short nap in some cases. “Sleeping on it” creates the opportunity for our brains to sift through the detritus of the day, to organize and make new connections. Avoiding stimulants and depressants may also be helpful. It’s fine to write at Starbucks, but they do sell decaf.
Leverage science
Boston neurologist Alice Flaherty, MD, Ph. D., became mightily interested in the mental aspects of writing after suffering disabling postpartum bouts of hypergraphia (an overwhelming urge to write, the flipside of writer’s block). She wrote The Midnight Disease about this and continues to address the intersection of science and creativity in her work. In a 2004 interview, Dr. Flaherty discussed the seasonal dip in creativity and productivity, similar to seasonal affective disorder (SAD), some writers live through annually. A relatively low risk and low-cost treatment she has investigated is the use of the full-spectrum light boxes first used to treat SAD. Another ploy is to anticipate this dip and schedule work accordingly.
Circadian rhythm may also play a part in creativity. In 2011, the journal Thinking & Reasoning published a study which found a person’s “optimal or non-optimal time of day” affected problem solving ability. Their counterintuitive take-home message: “tasks involving creativity might benefit from non-optimal time of day.” In other words, night owls (those whose “optimal time of day” is at night) might find creative activities, such as writing, easier to do in their off-peak hours — daytime. Early birds could give night-time writing a try.
Science is teasing out the mysteries behind writer’s block, bit by bit. Writers can leverage this knowledge to help keep their writing on track, often at little to no cost. Even minor studies — such as one finding the aroma of peppermint spurred alertness — can be leveraged. When I lag at the computer, I chew peppermint gum.
Consider seeking professional help
Difficulty performing cognitive tasks such as writing may reflect important, treatable health conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, depression and anxiety. If you suddenly develop trouble with your creativity or if you have persistent difficulties, consider seeking input from your healthcare provider. Discussing difficulties in writing performance with your physician can reap benefits beyond improved writing.
And of course, always remember — maybe a writer’s block is your brain telling you you’re headed in the wrong direction. Just sayin’…
D.I.Y. Writing Prompts
Create your own writing prompts with ease
Blank pages come in myriad forms. Ghostly rectangles on desktop screens. College-lined blue on white cheap paper. Yellow schoolchild tablets. Heavy pebbly stationary with a monogram. Yet they have a commonality: blank pages beg to be filled. With writing.
I prefer the blank white of my desktop. My fingers can fill a page up in no time at all, except when they can’t. When I’ve hit a wall and don’t know what to write next or what to write at all. Those are the times I need a prod, a prompt, a reset.
Writing prompts fit the bill for these and many other situations. They come in all shapes and sizes on the internet, but I tire of hunting for them and deciding whether or not they’re worth a share of my email address. Instead, I prefer the freshness of creating my own writing prompts. You might, too.
Here’s a few ways to create D.I.Y. writing prompts. All of them can be used multiple times.
Pick a favorite eloquent speaker
When you need a prompt, choose one of their quotes. Shakespeare, Maya Angelou, Mark Twain, Abraham Lincoln, Jane Austen, and Eleanor Roosevelt have left many pithy quotations. How could you be blocked after reading Angelou’s “Have enough courage to trust love one more time and always one more time.”
Find a photo prompt the easy way
Open a stock photo site on the internet and search for “popular” or anything else you desire. Take the first photo as your inspiration.
Eavesdrop
Eavesdropping on folks who talk loudly, who clearly have no expectation of privacy or secrecy, is fertile ground. One afternoon, walking through the social services department from my nearby desk in the health department, a voice from a cubicle opined, “Sometimes you have to go to jail for just being stupid.” I wrote it down. There’s a story or two in that offhand comment.
Create auditory prompts
Use the equipment you have to create a recorded series of sounds and/or songs. Play a bit or all of it to prod your writing.
Record your observations and oddball factoids
Use them later as writing prompts. You can record them as audio on your phone or by hand in a small notepad. The glint of the sun on a child’s hair, the aroma of the Italian bakery in Philadelphia, the echoes in an indoor swimming pool are all potential prompts. As are conspiracy theories from your quirky aunt. Not that I have one.
Look around
Whenever you need a prompt, stop right where you are and look around you. Pick the “-est” thing that catches your eye — the prettiest, the bluest, the oldest. You get the idea. Then take that as your prompt and write about the prettiest thing you see.
Collect random objects
Set aside a small box or basket for a few of the intriguing little objects you come across. A seashell, a fortune cookie’s prediction, a Christmas ornament, a postcard. These can trigger your writing by their appearance, their smell, and also by memories and emotions associated with them.
These are a few ways you can develop your own unique writing prompts while honing your observational skills. Be creative and have fun with them.