Writer’s Block Isn’t Real
Writer’s block isn’t real. Here’s why, and here’s why.
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Writer’s Block isn’t real. Now that is a BOLD statement. How many times have you sat staring at either a blank page or have gotten halfway through a scene only to find that the well of creativity has run dry with no sign of rain in the sky?
I have been there. Many times. As a writer of several novels, novellas and short stories ranging from crime, dark fantasy and horror, plus tonnes of social media posts and blog posts and articles, I have at least some authority to comment on this topic.
But we have to escape the notion that ‘Writer’s Block’ is actually a real thing. It isn’t. It’s something that we tell ourselves. It’s a lie. A ruse. A collective scapegoat that writers use to make their current predicament feel better. We attach some kind of romantic, creative notion to it that if only we could overcome this block in our brains, we could create our masterpiece.
Luckily for you, I have a toolkit which will not only break you out of your current bout of imagined writer’s block but also make sure you are never crippled with it again.
Step Number One – You’re the problem here.
The story isn’t the problem. Nor is the keyboard, the mouse, the screen or the word processor you’re using. It’s you. Sorry, not sorry. The problem is you have given the fabulistic idea of writer’s block its power. You need to take that back.
You need to understand that writer’s block isn’t real. It doesn’t exist. It’s something we tell ourselves is real to allow ourselves to not have to do the work that is required. It’s resistance, procrastination, or stress. But it isn’t an abstract idea as a brick wall being put around your brain and your creative ideas are being held ransom and you have to hit the siege at the right moment to free them.
Stop thinking that immediately. Your mindset is the problem. Rid it of its power by acknowledging that writer’s block is nothing but a creation of your own mind.
Step Two – This Isn’t the Finished Product.
You’re likely stuck on the first draft of a project. This is because you have this idea in your head that you must write perfectly the first time and that the delete and backspace buttons don’t exist. It’s called a draft for a reason. You can make mistakes. Write utter shit. Write storylines that can be omitted later and remove scenes and dialogue that don’t work. This is why we edit.
Step Three – The Pressure Cooker
Remember when you had that exam that you hadn’t been studying for for the six months you had leading up to it, and then you hit the books the night before? That’s because the proverbial axe was looming over your head on the chopping block. It’s time to apply this same mindset to writing in the pressure cooker.
Don’t give yourself all the time in the world to write a scene. Give yourself just fifteen minutes.
You will be amazed at what just fifteen minutes of concentrated effort can create. By using this method, I have crammed out thousands of words in a day consistently.
Set a timer for fifteen minutes and write anything and everything that comes out of your brain. Even if the words are quite literally, ‘I can’t think of anything to write.’ This will get the engine in your mind running again and will allow you to put words onto paper.
Step Four – Stop, Drop and Roll.
When the fifteen minutes are finished, stop what you’re doing, drop the project immediately and roll away from the desk. Create distance. Leave the room. Go outside if you have to, but step away from the project even if that’s mid-scene or sentence, and do whatever you like for five minutes.
This will give you both a breather and will create the connections in your brain that when you are sitting at the desk, it’s work time. Not phone and social media time. Not relaxation time, but purely and utterly time to get to work. That way when you sit down at the desk or the laptop or hell, at your work pad, your brain will switch into creative mode and not ‘sitting here staring at the computer mode.’
Step Five – Repeat.
Do the process again as many times as you need to. Keep track of your word count amounts. Make a game of it. Try to beat the record of the last sprint.
For more writing tips and a free story, sign up for my newsletter. Follow me on social media and let me know how you have found this post. I wish you the best with it.
P.S – I wrote this blog in fifteen minutes using this method!
Enjoy this post? Check out What t’s Really Like to be an Independent Author
- Jay Darkmoore
Why you should choose independent publishing.
If you’re thinking of Indie Publishing, click this article.
My name is Jay Darkmoore, and as an indie published author of seven novels (at the time of writing), spanning horror, grimdark fantasy, short stories and dark romance, I have dipped more than my toe into the world of self-publishing.
Here, I have listed fifteen reasons that self-publishing has an advantage over traditional publishing, to help you make that informed choice before you commit.
1 – Freedom to write what you like.
You may have heard this one, but the main pull for a lot of aspiring writers to self-publishing is not being constrained to what genre you can and can’t write. You might have a fiction that blurs the line between dark fantasy and action. Maybe you have a historical romance with aliens? Hell, a deep-sea diving book with goblins and werewolves. Whatever your genre, or a mix of genres, you can publish it because there is no specific shelf space that the story must fit into.
2 – Pick your own time frame for publication.
With traditional publishing, you will work to deadlines. This means drafts, editor slots, cover design slots and of course – the book release itself. These can be constraining and can be months, if not years in the future.
With indie publishing, you can decide your own schedule. You can produce work as frequently or infrequently as you like. Want to release three books in three months? Two books a year? Four books in six months then make your readers salivate for the fifth installation? It’s all yours.
And that is a hell of a bonus.
3 – Be your own boss.
If you’re anything like me, then you don’t like being told what to do. With indie writing, you can have your cake and eat it, so to speak. There is only yourself to answer to. You decide how productive you are, how you market and how you go about this crazy thing called storytelling.
You own all your successes and all your own failures.
4 – Market however you like.
Trad publishing will do some of the marketing for you, but not all. Those days are gone when you could get signed, sit back and collect royalty cheques. These days, publishing houses require you to do most of the heavy lifting yourself, and there may be constraints on how you are able to do this.
With indie publishing, this isn’t the case. Want a YouTube channel? Go right ahead. Want a TikTok? Knock yourself out. Want to scream n your neighbour’s roof at the top of your lungs? (Where this isn’t recommended, you certainly can…) Then go for it.
The world is your oyster, and how you reach that world is completely up to you.
5 – Better royalty rate.
A lot of people are drawn to trad publishing because of the advance in royalties you can receive when you get signed, which can be anything up to £10,000. Sounds great right? You can quit your day job and go sipping Pina Coladas in the Maldives.
Wrong. You may get the advance, but you won’t earn a penny until your book sales make that back. And that is with your 10% royalty rate for the face value of the book.
Now, take indie publishing (I only publish via Amazon, so I can’t speak for the rest), but you can earn up to 70% of the face price of the book in royalties.
So, if you sell a book at £10.00 –
Trad - £1.00 - £1.50 royalty
Indie - £3.50 - £7.00 royalty.
There is absolutely money to be made in the indie game. More money, for fewer sales, and if that doesn’t torque your jaw…
6 – Experiment with genres.
If you published your teen YA vampire series with a trad publisher and then decide you want to write post-apocalyptic sci-fi, your publisher might freak out. They might not agree to publish the new book and demand you stick to your current genre. You can be writing yourself into a box that you can’t get out of.
But with indie, that choice is completely up to you. It allows you to be as free and as creative as you wish to be.
7 – It’s faster.
If you submit the final draft to a trad publishing house in January, your book may not be on the shelf until October or even the following year, meaning that after you have been paid your advance and have spent so long writing the story, it won’t be in your reader’s hands for months, if not years! So, you won’t earn that royalty payment back anytime soon.
With indie writing, you decide when you publish, and you can start gaining royalties in just a few days.
8 – You’re in control over just about everything.
You have control over the book cover design, the blurb, the sales copy, the online description, the royalty rate, the scheduling, and the release date. You oversee the project from the first press of the keys to when you hit submit on your outlet.
9 – Financial clarity.
Trad publishers will sort the money side out for you, meaning that you won’t know if you’re making a dime until you get that royalty cheque through. Not only that, you might not even know in what format these books have come from or from where. Is it from your YA vampire series or your paranormal romance series? Is it from audiobooks or from your paperback or eBooks? You won’t know what to expect to come through the mail until it lands on your doorstep.
With indie publishing you can clearly see how much you are making, when it will be paid and through what sales and what format, which will give you a great indication of how to write, what to write and what to invest your time and money in.
10 – You retain the rights to your books.
With traditional publishing, you enter into a contract which you are obligated to, or they will drop you. If you do not honour that contract, and they drop you from their publishing house, then you no longer earn money from the books you have written and are being sold if you do not own the rights to them.
With self-publishing, you have complete control over the rights to your work in whatever format you have them in. This means you are free to write whatever and however you like.
11 – Work as much (or as little) as you like.
This is paired with number 3 of Being Your Own Boss. If you don’t like working mornings and you are more of a night owl, then go right ahead. If you can only write in the mornings and want to dedicate the afternoon to marketing and advertising, then the world is yours to play with. If you don’t like working weekends or on Tuesdays or past 4 pm, then you pick your own hours.
With no publishing house looming a deadline above your head, you can write as much, or as little as you like. This is a three-headed beast though, as you have to worry about burnout and procrastination.
12 – No Gatekeeper.
Who has the final call on a story idea or an ad campaign? You do. Who has to be consulted if you want to translate your stories to different languages and submit them to marketplaces abroad? Only you. Have a new idea? It’s your decision to make.
No relying on the current market or ongoing trends. It’s all up to you.
13 – Traditional publishing is still an option.
If you go traditional first and sign them to five books and then exit the contract, then as I mentioned before, you are going to lose the rights on those books. But if you indie publish first, and then decide to go trad, then you keep everything.
14 – Experimentation with advertising.
A traditional publishing house may require you to advertise or market to a specific audience or niche, be it the over 60’s or women under 30. They may have specific platforms and methods by which you have to do this. But with indie, you are free to experiment in whatever way you like, however you like.
15 – You learn to be a master of the craft.
With indie publishing, there are going to be setbacks (the same with any business venture). This means that you will learn how to market better, write better, edit better and produce better content. Without having other people doing some of the heavy lifting for you, you have to get good and get better with time. Meaning that with enough practise, you will become a hell of a self-publishing badass.
Writing as a Single Parent
There you are, folks! My 15 reasons why you should self-publish. If you liked this article, then share it with someone that is thinking of going trad and wants to know about self-publishing, or save it to your favourites bar on your desktop and have it to refer to in the future.
While you’re here, why not sign up for my newsletter for a free book?
Thanks for stopping by. Until next time.
- Jay Darkmoore