Cintia
asked
Anna Harrington:
Hi, my name is Cintia, and I’m from Argentina. Being a writer is my biggest dream in the whole world, but I’ve been unable to write for 3 years, and this is getting frustrating. I’m totally blocked and it’s not that I have just unfinished stories, but I’m also unable to start new things. Is there a way to fight this? How would you handle it?
Anna Harrington
Hi, Cintia,
Oh, I'm so sorry. Writer's block is so terrible! What I do to break out of it is to approach writing as play--try writing in a new place, if I normally write on a computer then I try writing it out by hand, I will try writing a famous scene (from like a Jane Austen novel) from a weird POV like the cat in the room, or I completely switch genres and try something completely different just to get the brain juices flowing. And don't forget--nobody said you had to start at the beginning. I once heard that Margaret Mitchell wrote the last chapter of Gone with the Wind first. I'm not certain if that's true, but what a great way to try to shake things up. Whatever you do, don't give up! Just try new things, and if nothing else, you've had some great life experiences to write about eventually.
Oh, I'm so sorry. Writer's block is so terrible! What I do to break out of it is to approach writing as play--try writing in a new place, if I normally write on a computer then I try writing it out by hand, I will try writing a famous scene (from like a Jane Austen novel) from a weird POV like the cat in the room, or I completely switch genres and try something completely different just to get the brain juices flowing. And don't forget--nobody said you had to start at the beginning. I once heard that Margaret Mitchell wrote the last chapter of Gone with the Wind first. I'm not certain if that's true, but what a great way to try to shake things up. Whatever you do, don't give up! Just try new things, and if nothing else, you've had some great life experiences to write about eventually.
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