Writing When You Don't Feel Like Writing

by

Stacy Tritt



Hello, blog readers. It’s been a while since you’ve heard from me. I apologize for my long absence. But, I can explain, I swear. You see, I’ve had this excuse.

To begin, I want to give a disclaimer that I am not really writing a how-to blog so much as telling a story of what has worked for me recently to reclaim my creative writing when I haven’t felt like writing. By sharing my story, I hope you might find something that will work for you as well.

I said I had an excuse, and believe me, I’m full of excuses for not writing. There is one excuse that stands above all the rest, however, and I am sure some of you have used this excuse as well. I wouldn’t really call it writer’s block so much as creative straight-jacket syndrome.

It all started back in 2011 during my junior year of college. I was taking quite a few classes that required me to do this thing called “academic writing.” And night after night, I was reading and analyzing, writing essays and citing documents. One page after another. Then, when I would sit down to write something for myself, I found myself staring at a blank Word document. I might get a paragraph or two in, but all that by-the-books, almost-scientific approach to writing had dried up my creative juices and replaced them with analytical word vomit that saturated my sponge of a brain.

Fast forward a few years. I now work full time as a hotel manager. I write reports constantly. Add the massive number of hours I usually work, and, well, my same old excuse is still valid. My creative brain has been left out in the elements, going unnourished for so long that I feared it was dead. And the prolifically creative person I had once been had been replaced by a corporate American robot. If my middle-school self knew what I had become, she would scream, cry, and threaten to run away from home.

Being creative, writing, drawing, and dancing—things I once loved—had become an increasingly difficult chore. And it hurt. But still, I was unwilling to give up. I had to find a way to bring the joy of writing back into my life. So, I started journaling—something I hadn’t done regularly in about ten years. It was hard at first. At the end of a long day, I would sit down and write something short and boring:

“Long day at work today. Had to prep for the owner’s visit. Two extra reports due, and had to inspect rooms. Pretty tired. Splurged on some Starbucks, though, so that’s cool.”

There were nights when the last thing I felt like doing was sitting down to write about my day, but I made myself do it. I could not go to bed until I had written at least one sentence. After some time passed, it became easier. My entries gained some flair, and creative ideas started to come to mind while I wrote, and I started jotting down plot lines and character backstories—as well as doodling in the margins. My entries became much less tidy, much less about just me, and more about the creative being inside of me that was slowly coming back to life.

“Today was my day off. I walked around the front lawn with bare feet, the grass over-long because it has been raining so much that Rob hasn’t been able to cut it. The ground was so soft, and the grass so gentle against my heels, it felt like walking on a giant, fluffy marshmallow.”

Now, I’m not claiming any of my entries are writing gold, but they allowed me to start exercising my creative brain again. The simple act of writing just for me culminated into an ability to sit down and write again.

Creativity doesn’t always just happen. It’s something that must be practiced. And writing when you don’t feel like you have anything good to say is hard. Yet, journaling is fairly easy. It doesn’t have to be perfect. You don’t feel the overwhelming need to go back and edit and reedit what you’ve just written before moving on to the next thought. Which is very liberating for me. So, now as I sit down to write, I’ve been trying to do it like a journal entry—get it all out, and then go back later to edit—something I have always struggled with. Without the practice of journaling, I don’t think I would’ve been able to do that. It’s a simple way to keep your creative mind fed and alive while you wade through mundane daily life. And keeping your creative mind alive and well is the difference between a week-long writer’s block dry spell, and a lifetime of thinking you’ve lost your creative voice.

I guess what I’m trying to say here is that I don’t know where you are in your creative journey or on your career path. But perhaps the two don’t have to be at such odds. What I hope my experience might teach you is not to give up hope. Your creativity won’t lie dormant forever—not if you begin to feed it, and nurse it, and spend time with it. It might not be easy, but it will be worth it. Keep trying. Keep writing. And support each other. That is the biggest gift we as writers can give one another—our support. Whether a novice or expert, we all need a little encouragement now and again. Journaling is my way of encouraging myself as a writer, and something I hope I don’t forget soon, because supporting ourselves is maybe even more important than supporting each other.

Sharing Homemade Bread

by Rhonda white  

Reprinted with permission from:

 http://rhondabrowningwhite.com/2015/07/29/sharing-homemade-bread/      

SHARING HOMEMADE BREAD

Today is bread day.

A few weeks ago, I succumbed to an urge that had been rising within me for a few months, and that was to make bread. Not just any bread, not bread from a boxed mix, and nothing that could be whipped up in a few minutes’ time, dumped into a bread machine, and popped out in a squarish loaf resembling an Amazon.com cardboard package. I wanted to make homemade sourdough bread; the kind that takes at least a week to prepare, the kind that must be fed and nurtured and allowed to rest, the kind created from—and by—living, breathing beings.

I should tell you that I killed my first starter.

There are certain, unbreakable, scientific laws that come with making homemade sourdough bread, and as ominous as that sounds, they’re actually quite simple to follow. That is, as long as you remember one of the most important rules, that being that you must stir your starter with a wooden spoon. Any contact with metal spoons (nickel, silver, aluminum, etc.) can introduce molecules that will kill the living microorganisms of yeasty sourdough starter. When feeding my sourdough starter the first time, you guessed it; I grabbed a metal spoon. Two days later, instead of the sweetly sour fragrance given off by healthy sourdough starter, mine reeked of rotting garbage, and the bubbles that occasionally rose to the surface had ceased. My starter had stopped breathing and died.

I’ve taken more care since then, and today as I stirred sugar, salt, oil, and flour into my starter and began kneading the dough, I thought of stories and of writing. Why is it that one creative act feeds another? I may never know the answer, but I’m always grateful for the inspirational nourishment. As I worked the dough, I recalled scripture from the King James Version of the Holy Bible: “And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst” (John 6:35). 

I then thought of even older writings, one from the ancient Anglo-Saxon story of Beowulf, in which the bakers charge a share of grain to make and bake bread in communal ovens for the entire community. I was further inspired to look up a couple of quotes that I remembered from other poems and stories, wondering why these snippets have stuck with me for so long, choosing today to bubble to the surface:

“A Book of Verses underneath the Bough
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread–and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!” –The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, 5^th Ed.

And from more recent works:

“They swallowed the dark bread. It was like daylight under the fluorescent trays of light. They talked on into the early morning, the high, pale cast of light in the windows, and they did not think of leaving.” –Raymond Carver, from “A Small, Good Thing”

“The heat of the bread burned into my skin, but I clutched it tighter, clinging to life.” –Suzanne Collins, from The Hunger Games

You probably recall many other examples of bread used symbolically in literature. Why is it that writers often mention bread in their stories—aside from the obvious, that their characters must eat? Bread does more than simply feed the hungry protagonist; it serves as metaphor for deeper issues and hidden secrets in a story. Bread is sometimes used to represent life and health, or the lack thereof (as in stale bread, or moldy bread); it is used to represent plenty, as in the Biblical story of the loaves and fishes; it’s sometimes symbolic of comfort, family, and unity, as in To Kill a Mockingbird; and, in Hansel and Gretel, breadcrumbs are used to mark the way back home. It’s this last metaphor that I chose to use in my current work in progress, tentatively titled Romie & Jasper’s Big Empty:

“I stand on the back deck of the house, overlooking the acres and acres of grapevines, and I feel small, as if I’ve shrunk. I wonder if it’s true, if I have become smaller each time I’ve moved, if I left behind a broken-off piece of myself, like a trail of breadcrumbs, so I can someday find my way back to whatever place might be home.”

As I kneaded my bread this morning, it occurred to me how much making homemade sourdough bread is akin to writing. We put in the basic ingredients—our nouns and verbs and punctuation—and we let them rest. Days later, we return to the mixture, feed it with fresh words, stir them around, and let them breathe. After more respite, we keep a carefully measured portion, toss out what isn’t needed, and we add something sweet, something salty, and we work out the lumps and bubbles, ensuring that when we are done, it will rise and nourish all who taste it.

My sourdough recipe makes three loaves: one for today, one for later in the week, and one to share with friends. Sharing homemade bread—and memories and stories—with friends is my favorite part of the artistic process: it is the giving of one’s creativity, of one’s effort, of oneself, however noble or humble that gift may be.

“And he took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me.” Luke 22:19 (KJV)

© 2015. Rhonda Browning White. All Rights Reserved.

This has been reposted with permission from Rhonda’s blog, http://rhondabrowningwhite.com/2015/07/29/sharing-homemade-bread/