6 Brilliant Ways to Avoid and Conquer Writer’s Block

This is the second part of my series about writing. You can read the first part here.

Google writer’s block and this is what you’ll find at the top :

writer’s block

ˌrʌɪtəz ˈblɒk/

phrase of writer

ˌrʌɪtəz ˈblɒk/

1. 1.

   the condition of being unable to think of what to write or how to proceed with writing.

Writer’s block can afflict anyone, anytime. Remember that time when you felt you hadn’t written anything on your blog for a fortnight and yet couldn’t think of one topic to write on? That’s writer’s block. No vaccine can stop you from being struck by it once in your lifetime (at the very least). We are going to look at ideas on how to prevent and conquer it.

Avoiding Writer’s Block :

1. Be Clear About Your Writing Goals :

Writer’s block won’t announce in advance when it is going to strike. What, then, should you do? Be aware of what you want to achieve with your writing. If you are a recreational blogger, writing when the mood takes you and when there’s enough time, you should know your niche and what your last few posts are building towards. If you have a troubleshooting blog, you must know what kind of posts your readers expect from you. E.g., what can you write next that will solve their problems?

How does this help?

Being clear about the type of content you are going to put up helps in uncluttering the mind and focussing when the going gets tough. When you are stuck, having an idea of what the audience desires from you can be extremely helpful in making through.

2. Write Regularly :

Let’s face it. How often do you write? Daily? Weekly? Your frequency of getting up-close-and-personal with your pen/keyboard is inversely proportional to the likelihood of your getting stuck with writer’s block. Your brain is like any other muscle. The more you exercise it, the better and more handsome its output will be. So like those abs and biceps you obsess on for hours every week, let your brain work too.

As with gymming, writing also demands regular attention. The best way is to write daily. That way, your brain keeps analysing and forming new ideas making it essentially an idea generator. No more poring over the blank screen for hours on end. Get. Set. Write.

Conquering Writer’s Block :

3. Use Life Experiences :

Often when you’ve had to take a long break from your writing because of prolonged and pressing real-life situations, you may find it difficult to slot right back into the frame of mind you had before the interruption. The flow is disturbed and finding new things to write about can be a difficulty.

Enter : your own life.

Regardless of the kind of blog you have, you can find inspiration.

Photography blog? Post that wonderful landscape shot of the sunset you snapped. Like this one.

Cooking blog? Tell your readers about the delicious recipe you had when you went to your aunt’s.

Travel blog? Tell them of the places you went to, or the ones that are your dream destinations (with reasons).

Anonymous blog? Tell them the four things your learnt in your break that have helped you resolve to be a better human being.

All these examples are meant to convey one thing — there are any number of ideas that we can use from our daily experiences and create a blog post out of them. Sample this post where I tell the story of how I made a desperate sprint after a running train (I actually ran 😀 ).

4. Dumping Sessions :

When stuck, you need to do is to pour out all the confusion and the memory shards that you have in your mind. Looks nonsensical? Don’t worry. They aren’t even supposed to make sense. They are a way of getting the idea highways in your brain cleaned up. The more you dump, the better it’d be for you.

After a couple of sessions of memory dump, you will see the difference. Your now shining highways will witness traffic, trickling at first and slowly transforming into a deluge.

5. Read, Watch, Write :

You are finding it difficult to create one simple blog post and your reader is choc-a-bloc full of posts, from blogs and topics you follow. Why not turn to them for inspiration? Reading is basically consuming what someone else crafted. It is a passive activity. And yet, reading posts and leaving enlightening, thoughtful comments on them can be a helpful way of rediscovering what made you fall in love with writing in the first place. Good comments also bring in traffic to your own blog. Win-win!

Another thing you can do is share your views on a book you recently read. Or why you absolutely hate the last movie/TV series you watched. Doesn’t have to be a full-blown review if you don’t feel like it, even ruminations will suffice it.

See, no new ideas required. All you have to do is give voice to the thoughts that occurred in your mind while experiencing the book/movie.

In the first part, I talked about visualization and how it helps us write better. It is an excellent way of getting over writer’s block too.

6. Use Writing Prompts :

WordPress provides Daily Writing Prompts. Use these prompts when you are short of ideas yourself. You’ll be a part of a global group that is writing on the same topic, all at once. What’s more? It brings views from previously unknown readers too, people seeing your post’s hyperlink in the comments section of the prompt.

That’s it for today. The next part will arrive soon (sooner than this one did anyway. 😉 )

Do follow me on Facebook and Twitter. If you want me to do a post on a writing-related topic, please convey the same in the comments section. I’d love to read your feedback on this one too.

Thanks for reading.

I’ll leave you with this :

Images Courtesy : Google Images