I want to explore this concept, this metaphor, of a writer's block. Is it helpful? Not really. After all, as a writer, if you buy into it as an idea, it can stop you from writing. You start believing that you have an obstruction to your natural writing flow. You become blocked.
But what if we look at it from a different vantage point? What if we take the word block, and see it more like a block used by a butcher. A tool, that is a part of the craft, and helpful? Then the concept, the metaphor, is totally different. Although the word itself hasn't changed, the meaning it conveys has. As a writer, I can then take my block out and use it. I can begin to chop up my forming ideas, spread them out into bitesize paragraphs, and perhaps, usefully package them up for others to consume.
This is but one idea, one metaphor, that I can utililise with my writer's block, but I know this may upset some. After all, the idea now has become associated with a butcher, and as a writer, I don't want to butcher my writing. So how else could I play with this term? Let's take the imaginary block, perhaps I can still view it as a block of wood, or perhaps stone, and look at it with the eyes of a carpenter or sculptor. It is now something I can use as a starting point, a rectangular shape that can be explored.
What will I create with it? There are so many choices opening up. I might begin by sketching out the shape of a woman, or a man. As I chisel into the block a character takes shape, and my imagination stirs a little more and I begin to see their definition. A story for this character begins to form before my eyes, and the block that was once so ordinary is now something else entirely. Once again, my writer's block serves as a tool unlocking my flow of creation.
As a child, I played with blocks. I could stack them high and build a tall tower. A place for Rapunzel to let down her hair. Sometimes the blocks were decorated with letters and new words were learnt: cat, dog, and a whole menagerie of other animals were brought to my attention through the magic of play. A powerful use of a block, wouldn't you say?
The journey for the writer always begins with a blank space, and ideas can be formed if we sit with patience and allow them to form. Even a writer's block can be played with if we allow it to become part of the creative process.
The usual way of thinking about a writer's block is to perceive an imaginary impediment getting in the way of the creative flow. However, it is not necessary to view the block as an obstacle. What if instead, the writer took the block and began to explore it. What is it? Is it an obstacle? Is it an absence of ideas? Is it an absence of thought? Is it a desire for originality? There are many traps that we can find ourselves falling into. But are they real? No, they are imagined. Imagination is boundless, even though it can appear to trip us up to the extent that we find ourselves believing in it as our reality.
Let's explore this thought a little more. A writer sits down to write. They are faced with the blank screen, or the blank page, and suddenly they begin to believe they have nothing to write about. They believe they are in the grip of a writer's block, and instead of ideas flowing from them to their keyboard, or through their pen, they sit with the blankness, getting nowhere. At this point, no doubt, they are feeling a little raw. There are emotions swirling inside them, and a story is forming inside their head. It is a story that they keep to themselves as they tie themselves up in its heaviness. Now they are the block. I do not know what emotion they are feeling. But for me the one that surfaces when I allow myself to believe in this type of block, I label doubt.
For me, ideas pop up, effortlessly, all the time, but then I push them back down. Doubt is then the block that stands in my way. Doubt is not a useful tool. It gets me nowhere. I become stationary, petrified in a limited space of confusion. So, as this is the block that I can and do experience, let's explore it a little further.
What is doubt? It's not something tangible. It is a feeling inside of me. When I experience it, I attach a story to it. The story might go something like: I can't write that! That's not good enough. That's stupid! Or, something else along those lines. But what if I didn't do that? What if, instead of getting involved in the story of doubt, I sat with the feeling; I allowed it time to let itself be known to me. What if, instead of labelling it as doubt, I just recognised it as an energy within me? An energy that gets stirred up as part of my creative process, and is entirely of my own making. After all, creativity is something that stirs me. It makes sense that I will feel it. The problem isn't the feeling then, but the label and the story I somehow stick on it.
The feeling I define as doubt is uncomfortable. It is something I don't particularly like. It feels far too powerful. And, unfortunately, I have allowed myself to spin stories that have taken me away from my writing, instead of just sitting with the discomfort. When I do this, when I allow myself to leave my writing, the feeling subsides, but the cost is that I do not write. I numb myself to my creativity and continue on with my humdrum life. I stay enclosed inside that other less than useful metaphor, my comfort zone. But, that is something I'm no longer prepared to do.
Instead, I will use my writer's block and explore it. I will feel the stirred up energy of my creativity, experience the discomfort, and step outside the limiting boundaries of the comfort zone to find something new. Doubt, my imaginary old friend, you no longer need to keep me safe. There is a brave new world for me to create. And suddenly,I find myself hurtling forward from the starting block, and write.