On Creativity and Howto Vanquish Writer's Block
ByCharles Atkins
Writer's Block--a sort of creative constipation--is littlemore than negative self talk.  It's asuseful as a jar of marshmallow fluff added to the laundry.  And the good news is, it's completely fixableand here I speak as both a psychiatrist and published author.    So here's the deal, and how I learned about nurturingcreativity and the opposite--stomping it out like the swarm of roaches who'vefound the fluff in the laundry.  When Iwas a psychiatric resident, one of my year-long rotations involved providedpsychotherapy to articulate students at an Ivy League university.  Here, I observed something interesting.  The Grad students who were zipping throughtheir theses had both internal and external positive regard.  They had mentors and peer networks thatsupported their work.  Their sparks ofideas got bellowed into roaring flames by doctoral supervisors who providednecessary critiques, but were quick to underscore what was good and what worked.  On the flip side I sat through many an hour with distraught,anxious and depressed pre-docs whose degrees hinged on shipwrecked theses.  This crew had ponderous self doubt.  Some was entirely self generated, but forothers they had problematic relations with their faculty supervisors.  My patients would complain that they'd go inwith idea after idea only to have it shot down and leave their mentoringsession feeling aimless, discouraged and hopeless. 
Because this was therapy, both they and I explored all of this negativity,where it came from, and more importantly, how to get rid of it.  As might be expected we found long historiesof intense self doubt and internal criticism. We learned about withholding fathers and mothers for whom a single 'B' onan otherwise perfect record was not good enough.  These now internalized voices, especiallywhen fueled by external criticism, made forward movement nearly impossible. 
These observations on what feeds creativity and what shut itdown led me to a series of realizations. The kernel of which comes down to the following--writer's block is inyour head, and to get rid of it all you have to do is shut down any negativeself talk and doubt.  It's that simple...andit's that hard.
 Around the same time I was doing this clinical work Iattended my one and only writing seminar. It was with the Canadian author/writer Barbara Turner-Vesselago.  Entitled "Freefall" it was allabout diving into one's writing and shutting down these negative thoughts.  Beyond this she encouraged participants toleap into the heart of resistance.  As apsychiatrist I completely understood this. Because those things we don't want to look at, talk about, or God forbidwrite about, are gold mines of intense emotion. And Ms. Turner quickly proved that our fears and anxieties can bebottomless wells from which we draw sensually luscious writing.  You just need to take a deep breath and divein.  
A connected point to all of this--again from personalobservation--is that my creative juice is not to be messed with.  As a writer I know that letting doubt creepin will shut things down.  To get aroundthis--and why I never get writer's block--I have some quick fixes.  Most of these run through my brain in theflash of a heartbeat, others require more definitive actions.  Here they are:             When faced with a slowdown in writing, I askmyself the following:  "What don'tyou want to write about?"  I thenproceed to write about that very thing. If negative thoughts intrude, I tell myself I can always rip it up later.  As a sidebar, when I'm doing fiction, I'llask the question from the perspective of my character.  What is she/he most resistant about or scaredof?  Let's go there now. Editorial automatic thoughts.  These are fleeting thoughts we can all fallprey to.   "Thisis no good." "Yourargument doesn't hold water.""Geez!  Will you ever stop making run-onsentences?" These Idismiss by reminding myself--there's always time to edit, but at the moment Ijust             want to write and get mythoughts on the page.  Distraction. While different from the negative self talk I've been discussing,writer's--and everyone else--have all kinds of things to distract us from thetask at hand.  Here, it's a matter ofsticking to what I'm about, and reminding myself that the laundry, changing thekitty litter, shopping, 'Words with Friends' etc. will get done after I finishmy day's writing.Negative outside influences.  Similar to my example about mentors, andothers, who can pour acid on our creativity we sometimes find ourselvespartnered with people where the creative juices do not mesh.  Sadly, my take here, is best to cut yourlosses and move on.  Your/my creativityis too precious to engage in this kind of head butting. Necessary criticism:  Here, I want to briefly touch on vitalcritiques that aid in the editorial process, and for those of us who care aboutsuch things--getting published.  I'll usethe example of my own agent, the legendary Al Zuckerman.  Al starts each of his critiques with at leastone genuinely positive comment--'Charles, you have many wonderful storyelements here.'  Soon to be followed by,'and this is why this manuscript is not working in its current form...'  Yes, my ego takes a little bruising--'What do you mean?  Isn't all my writing wonderful?'  To remedy this I let his comments fermentovernight.  I then start in the morningwith a mental reframe--Al, wants the workto be strong and saleable, he's absolutely right that there are too manycharacters being introduced too fast. And you wrote this once, just start in on the rewrite, do it page bypage and it'll be done before you know it.Take a break, do something physical and comeback to the writing.  Some of my bestideas have come on the elliptical--including this essay.  I also find that if there's something missingfrom a piece, the answer magically appears in the midst of an hour'scardio.  I don't know why; it justhappens.So that's it.  Whenfaced with writer's block, the key to forward movement is learning how tosilence negative thoughts.  Whether theseare purely internal or fueled by those around us, with practice you can learnhow to push these away and let your creativity flow.