Paula R. Hilton
I'm not going to say that I don't believe in writer's block, but I'll admit that I hate the term. What I do believe is that if you say you're blocked, you will be. It's a terrible, self-fulfilling prophecy. If progress on a book stalls for a bit, I prefer to see the lull as the story simply needing a little more time on the stove to simmer. If I trust that the ingredients in the pot are good ones, I can be patient and deal with the frustration of those days when the words refuse to come quickly. So if one project isn't cooperating, my trick for staying productive is to choose a different one for a bit, say an essay, short story or poem. The key, for me, is to never stop writing and to never give up on your novel. As long as you're committed to it, the lulls aren't as scary as you might think and they start happening with less frequency too, especially when you continue to write right through them.
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