A thread about writers’ block? Thread about writers’ block.

Did you all know I basically stopped writing for a year and a half?

2018: I mount two plays, I move, I leave my job of 8 years, my creative partnership of 7 years ends, I am well and truly burnt out.

The writing dries up.

I’ve never felt anything like it, before or since. On the rare occasions I actually had *ideas,* it was like squeezing blood from stone. The words dribbled out awkward, bland. The voice wasn’t mine. My fingers felt like wood.

It honestly felt as though I’d had a stroke and I needed to relearn everything. In my darkest moments, I wondered if this actually was a distant early symptom of...something.

Burnout is insidious. Trying to push through only prolongs it. There’s no easy fix, or even a concrete fix, it’s just time. This wasn’t what I wanted to hear, of course, so I beat myself up mercilessly.

Shockingly, that didn’t help me write.

Even a week sequestered in rural Ireland didn’t really help. I wrote a flash piece that was okay, and nothing else that survived. But I also saw many horses and castles and museums, so I still count that trip a win.

Back home, I angsted quite a lot on my blog (maybe I should pick the blog up again). @angrykem went on a long walk with me and listened to my angst. She said sometimes, writers go into a chrysalis and you can’t rush it, and eventually, it just breaks open again.

I read a post on @theodoragoss’s blog that said, “in order to write a particular novel, you have to become the sort of person who can write that novel.” And I tried to tell myself that with so much personal upheaval, I just hadn’t yet become the next version of myself.

(Here’s the post, incidentally. Dora’s blog is an excellent resource for writers: https://theodoragoss.com/2012/11/02/becoming-the-writer/)

Somewhere towards November 2019, I wrote “The Bone-Stag Walks.” I love this story. I’m proud of it. People have said very nice things about it. But it was not my usual process: I hacked that story from the ice.

So was I *better*? Were the words coming back? Not...really.

Maybe a tiny trickle where before had been desiccation. I wrote another story that felt more like my accustomed way of writing. But then the next one flopped HARD.

But in Feb 2020, I went to Boskone (my last con, weird). @jaspkelly and I had our traditional breakfast and I hesitantly broached some of this.

“Falling in love takes a lot of brainpower,” he said. “Ending relationships takes a lot. Changing jobs. But so does writing. And sometimes our brains just can’t do everything.”

Somewhat comforted, I went to my annual writers’ retreat in early March and got 10k on the novella I’d been planning forever. The words were mostly wrong, but they were words.

Then I flew home to Canada, and a week later, everything came crashing down.

You know most of this bit. Lockdowns. Toilet paper shortages. Sourdough. The sheer adrenaline of those early pandemic days. Meanwhile, my personal life was going through another upheaval.

I was still plugging away at this novella. Through doggedly writing *something* on it every day (and through the support of the Ottawa Crew, you know who you are), I was getting some kind of rhythm. Not comfortable, but better than anything I’d had for months.

Then personal things really fell apart.

And -

I wrote.

I wrote and I wrote and I wrote. I finished the novella within three days. I moved onto short stories right after. I sold two almost immediately; the rest are circulating; more are in the works. A novel sprang to life; outline’s done and I’ll start drafting next month.

The dam simply *burst.*

And my writing felt - different. Darker, heavier, sinuous and fanged. But the process, the rhythm, that felt like coming home.

So what happened?

I think it was a combination of factors. Kari and Dora were right; I was in transition, in chrysalis. And Jim was right too: my brain couldn’t handle everything until there was one thing too many and it said, “F*ck it.”

If you’re struggling to write now, I’d say - look, we’re in a period of transitions on a personal AND global scale. Never in our lifetimes has so much change and uncertainty and fear come from so many corners at once. This is a liminal space and it SUCKS.

Be gentle with yourself. You are becoming. Write things that bring you joy. Don’t worry about selling a staggering tome of genius; forget the Hugo and Nebula. Writing at all right now is an act of defiance.

You just need to hang on. Survival is the new goal.

I know the words always return. I don’t know how they’ll return for you. Will you get a dam-bursting torrent, or will you look up one day and realise that everything is different?

Who knows? But they do come back. I promise.

I leave with a quotation by Theodore Rothke:

“A lively understandable spirit
Once entertained you.
It will come again.
Be still. Wait.”

/Fin