So, I'm wondering what the fuck I can do to disengage from emotions and stress and anger and family dynamics and on and on and on so that I can regain access to the literary part of my mind that seems to currently be smothered into nothingness by all that is going on inside my head lately.
I'm not naive nor egotistical enough to think that I'm the only person who has been stymied by intensely emotional situations in life to the extent that it negatively effects their work. With that recognition in mind, I am the only person I know (in real life) who seeks to be a better writer, or a writer at all, so I don't have anyone in my circle who can offer advice on what to do when the demons of our worse nature won't let us get down to business in front of the blank page.
What do you do when nuclear bombs go off inside your mind and soul, leaving devastation in the city center of your creative existence?
Write about it...
I journal when I get in that place. You can't get around what you're feeling, you have to get THROUGH it, so write it out. You can practice your craft and get some healing at the same time.
I'm sorry you're in that place right now. Remember that it's temporary.
Writing about it may give you a certain clarity about the issue which you may get from just feeling it all. The best thing to do is to write about it, so at least you're still writing. I have a bunch of pages from earlier in my life that seem utterly alien looking back.
Let me ask this to all who espouse the 'write about it' technique: Does exploring the turmoil through writing ever get you further riled up and upset? I have a habit of making myself angrier and angrier or sadder and sadder when I think about or talk about something that is bothering me, so I am worried that writing about it might bring a similar result. Never been a journaler before, though, so I could react totally differently if I tried something like that.
Well, you're now asking two different questions.
If you want to know how to get your mojo back, then using highly emotional experiences in writing is a good way to go. Writing about what scares you or makes you sad or excites you can be easier than writing from a blank place.
If you're asking how to feel better, then writing may or may not help, and that's something you would know better than us. If writing makes you feel worse, it might still be great writing, which might make you feel better, but if it depresses you too much to pick up a pen again, then you need to work on your emotional state first.
I made the thread mainly to solicit advice/suggestions on how to get through a type of writers' block that I seem to get when I'm overwhelmed with emotional things going on in my life. Not really looking to use writing as therapy, per se, but really just trying to see if anyone else has trouble writing when they're consumed with tough situations in real life and if so, how do they resolve the literary inactivity.
I don't hold on to hte illusion that by writing I will somehow feel better. I just would like to be able to write even when burdened which is something I've never been really good at.
I used to be a prolific artist as a hobby (mainly sketching) and I found that when I was upset or the shit was pummeling the fan, I would be the most productiive with paper and pencil. In the writing arena, however, the opposite has been true. I'm supposed to have a Thunderdome story done by today and am supposed to have several thousand words already on a novel project I'm working on, but have been so immobilized with family and emotional bullshit that I haven't been able to write a fucking word in almost a week and a half.
So, yeah, that's a bit more of the specifics of what I am asking - if that clears up anything.
My brother passed away in November. I just didn't write for a few months.
Honestly, I think that was the best thing for me. I had to face what happened and my emotions. I had to deal with it in healthy ways (which didn't include writing for me, but for some, it may). I had to experience it and understand it. Now that I'm on the other side (as much as someone can be from a loss like that), my emotions are free enough that I can write again, and I can draw on it.
I fought it for a bit. I tried to write, but nothing came. Everything seemed so inconsequential in comparison. So I just let the grief run its course and hoped I came out the other side.
Sometimes, you just gotta step away from writing and live your life, and for me, that's proven especially true during dark times.
Stop writing to fill a project or a deadline or a battle. Accept that slow downs happen. Then just write what you feel. That might be an upbeat happy go lucky short story to take your mind off it, a memoir that really gets in the pain you are feeling, whatever. Just sit down with whatever you like to write with (not are most productive, whatever you like to use) and let it come on out. No limits, no requirements, no expectations. One hundred words, an outline, 5 chapters in a new book, or anything you put out is okay.
Most of the time when I, or most writers I know well, can't finish a project it is because something else we want to write about more is in the way. You do that for a few hours, sort of free up the drainage ditches, and then come back the day after and write about what you think is a good idea to write about.
My Dad's death was horrific on lots of levels, and I wrote a memoir about it I'm revising now. For me it was lancing a boil. It hurt, but the only way for scar tissue to grow in was get all the pus out. Now it is just a story, something that happened. Not sure the details of what is up with you, don't feel pressure to share, but hope that helps.
Sorry to hear about your brother, Tim, and your dad, Dwayne. :(
Inconsequential... that is definitely an apt characterization, Tim. That's exactly how it all feels. My whole family is in a shit storm, at least one part of one side, and the other part is a group of brain-dead, racist, hate-mongering morons who either don't give a fuck about other people's feelings or are too blinded by their fearless leaders like Gleen Beck or Sean Hannity to see that this isn't the time to go on rants about immigration or 'dem goshdern evil mooslims...' and more. They are inconsequential. Everything I start to write feels inconsequential. Going to the store to get something to stop my tummy from growling since i have'nt rememberd to eat is inconsequential. Ugh, all of it.
I barely got to a point recently that I don't think about my grandfather (who died last fall) every day and then this whole thing happens and I lose a cousin, basically two cousins. I thought my battle with Moon meant I had gotten out of the emotional rut I had been in the past several months, then the marathon thing. I got back from being with family in Boston a couple days ago and figured I could pump out a story for my battle with Renfield (which I still haven't done and he is nice enough to not be calling me a flaky piece of shit) but nothing came. My trip, itself, was just a huge waste of time because we couldn't even have a funeral, and my cousins' folks couldn't even come to the states so the whole fucking thing was inconsequential really.
Fuck, I need to write. I want to, but nothing happens when I pull up a blank Word doc. I just sit there staring like a moron for a half hour then go read the news (bad idea every time). I just want to shut off all of my brain except that part from which rises my stories and poems and ideas and shit.
Sorry... rambling like a crazy person.
Thanks Strange, but it was years ago, and it is for the best he went. And that wasn't you rambling like a crazy person.
Thanks, man. If you're anything like me, though, feeling like you need to write is only making it worse. See if you can let that go. Spend time with the family you do love. Do some things to clear your head, like going to a baseball game or exercising or shooting some aliens in a video game. Hang out with friends who support you in positive ways. Resign yourself to not even try to write for a few days or a week, and then come back to it when that apprehension you feel about needing to write has gone.
When I'm in that funk, that's what I've found works for me because it reminds me of what's important and gives me fuel to write. Honestly, what you may be feeling is just that you're tapped out and wringing your emotions like a sponge. You may just need to recharge and be happy again.
If you're anything like me.
Thanks for the input, Tim. I am likely a bit like you (so sorry for you) and you might be right about the emotional wringing.
Kinda gone on a movie watching spree the last two days, which always helps me move my mind away from my feelings. I just feel really guilty when I'm not being productive.
Yeah, putting all that pressure on yourself--commanding your brain to vomit forth word count, and then scolding yourself for being unable to do so, is counterproductive as hell. I've been there, we all have, but try to get out of the mindset that says you have to write, regardless of what you're feeling. Just think, feel, exist for a while. Do things away from the laptop or typewriter or library, and get some contrasting stimuli from the outside world; then writing will be effortless.
If you are talking about it, you will be fine. The ones who shut down and close off are the ones I worry about.
Yeah, very true, Drea. I'll be fine, I just wish I could stop being so unproductive. The house is clean as hell, but I haven't written a fucking word in two weeks. You're totally right, though. I'm definitely like that. When I clam up, that's when you want to batten down the hatches.
I look at it like this - I've been "a writer" for over twenty years. Just because I have a period of inactivity or unproductivity is not going to change that.
Not comparing myself to her at all, but Geogia O'Keeffe was one of the most prolific American painters ever - + 2,029 according to the museum named in her honour - and she was famous for, amongst other things, great spans of time where she was not generating work at all. When she worked, she worked. I learned that, and I cut myself some slack. Sometimes you just gotta let a field go fallow.
It, the condition of emotion exists in your head, inside, you control it. That may be hard to fathom much less accept, but that's the long and short of it. As it exists in your head it manifests in your body. Ask yourself why you are not dealing with the issues. Who needs to be divested, invested or brought close? Why do you feel the way you do, trace it back to what it all means to you. You've become locked in a pattern and are looping about it while not dealing with the problem. Is it time for a break? Do you need to sit out certain events or gatherings to get some distance and let perspective take root? What horse are you riding?
If you tell your story to yourself and use various characters as a foil what is the story going to be about?
Try just letting go. People will be people and families always have dynamics. You don't need to be bound up in it to the extent that it rules your life. You can't solve everyone's problems, fix bad situations or relieve pressure that others feel. They have to do that. A meal's nice, a couch is great, and a few bucks never hurts but people have to solve their own problems. If you can get into a good space all else follows or not which is in the end just the way things are.
Thank you, fport. I greatly appreciate that entire statement.
