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Goodreads asked Mark Hummel:

How do you deal with writer’s block?

Mark Hummel Ritual, ritual, ritual. Write everyday. Use the same tools. Be obsessive about your personal writing process, especially if it is eccentric. Basically, as Flannery O'Connor said, show up everyday. Sometimes there are little tricks--changing format (like writing an entire scene in a journal if your norm is to compose at the computer), or creating ridiculous exercises for yourself (like "This chapter will be written entirely in dialogue.") that can shake something loose. But generally, I find staying ritualistic about work ethic and approach allows you to push through blockage, even if painfully so. Lastly of course, as Paige Stegner said, "lower your standards" (not for the whole project of course, but to get through the block, to write the next scene, etc. for a writer's life is lived in revision after all.

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