Writer's Block

It must be very common for people engaging in creative processes to encounter a block. More often than not, that’s the biggest hurdle creators face. Be it writers, poets, songwriters, comedians, filmmakers, game-developers, designers, architects or any other people engaging in creative exercises, blocks are a huge hurdle that’s often difficult to overcome. They take up a lot of time, and are also responsible for loss of enthusiasm among a lot of people. In fact, a lot of people do not want to engage in a creative profession because they have to constantly come up with new ideas which are also good and engaging enough. A regular day job is a much easier task is what they believe.
But here lies the catch. According to quite a few people in these businesses, blocks do not exist but are a created phenomenon. Most of these people have a background in regular day jobs and their take on the situation is that if one took writing as any other regular job, then they would have faced much lesser hurdles. In a regular workplace, one can never argue that they do not feel like working. These professionals believe that you have to apply those same work values in your own creative processes. Also, once one takes up the task of writing more regularly, they stay in more of practice and in greater touch with their skill, which inadvertently also helps develop and improve their craft.

There is another take on the whole scenario regarding the occurrence of blocks. Many professionals believe on improvising entirely on the go. However, this at the very outright is a very limited and restricted approach – it might be suitable for some mediums like standup comedy, slam poetry and storytelling, but not for other stuff like writing a song or a movie script. Also, the creative processes of different people vary by different degrees. While some people may be quite excellent improvisers and able to spin a tale from a mere word, others find it only proper that everything be written down before hand and practiced a dozen times. Thus, the idea of complete improvisation is a tricky and incomplete solution.

Of course, the traditional method of dealing with blocks is by engaging in leisurely activities when faced with obstructions. While most established creators do take this route, it is not really advisable for a beginner to take long leisurely breaks between writing sessions as they won’t have as many resources at their disposal as those who are already established. Plus of course, the time factor comes into play. Beginner creators often are already engaged with something more regular and time-consuming. In fact, writing is the leisurely activity in the eyes of everyone including their institution/employer in such cases and thus, not much time can be devoted to take off from writing.

Having said all of that, though, it remains to be said that sparks of ideas usually come at the oddest of hours to a person. It might be possible that the person doesn’t get any ideas during their regular slot of writing. However, in such cases, one just has to be careful enough to note down ideas mentally, and note them down somewhere so that they can work on them during their designated slot. And if all goes well, one might reach that extra mile. To quote the genius called Biswa Kalyan Rath, “there is no such thing as a writer’s block. There may be writer’s laziness, or reluctance, or inactivity. You have to imagine writing as a 9 to 5 job process, and then when you start sitting regularly and doing it, things automatically will start rolling out.”