I HAVE WRITER'S BLOCK!!!!!!!!!! WHY GOD, WHY!?

[ObeyBunny]

Make writing prompts (instructions that help someone with writer’s block get a paragraph or two of story out of him)

Here’s mine:
Give yourself 30 seconds and make a list of things you can find at a hospital
(example: lab coats, white tile, potted plants, metal trays, sick people).

Now write a scene that is as far removed from a hospital (or hospital-like) as possible.
(example: under the ocean, in the eye of a tornado, from the perspective of a 20th century man who has been sent back in time.)

 

[ObeyBunny]

Mine:
Think of earth, but subtract one thing (light, gravity, the lithosphere, flowering plants, people and animals with IQ's over 60) and create an ecosystem (lifeforms) that would thrive there.

(if earth had no lithosphere [the crust + the upper most part of the mantle] then animals and plants would have a high tollerence for heat. Animals would have fiew cells. Anything taken out of the lava would freez to death at normal temperatures.)

Create a scene in a story that involves this world /characters/ concepts.

 

[Tamske]

Mine:

A character wakes up in an alternate reality. That alternate reality looks on the surface just like his (her) own, but there is one difference.
Everything always goes as planned. Trains never get too late, remote controls always work from the first time; if you want a certain product there is plenty of it in the store...
Of course, if the character is too late with anything, it's assumed it is his fault, because only that can make something deviate from perfection.

Easy: the character is a Perceiver.

Difficult: the character is a 60% Judger.

The story begins when the character notices for the first time there is something strange.

 

[Mole]

I don't know why you have writer's block, I don't, for when I sit down to write I become a different person.

The person before I sit down to write has no idea at all what to write, and is mildly panicky at the thought of writing. But the person sitting down, just looks into himself and writes what he sees.

I must admit I am mildly annoyed with you - why don't you just look into yourself and write what you see?

 

[Asterion]

Isn't it easier to write when you have something in your head to write down? People frequently write books about their experience or articles about something they have uncovered. I figure that if you're writing creatively, you need something in your head before you can do it? Even the most creative and original art had to be inspired by a collection of memories and information. You can't force something from nothing, your head would explode! So fill your head with experience, knowledge, advice or random crap.

 

[Totenkindly]

I don't know why you have writer's block, I don't, for when I sit down to write I become a different person.

The person before I sit down to write has no idea at all what to write, and is mildly panicky at the thought of writing. But the person sitting down, just looks into himself and writes what he sees.

I must admit I am mildly annoyed with you - why don't you just look into yourself and write what you see?

Because not everyone works like you do.

 

[miss fortune]

I must admit I am mildly annoyed with you - why don't you just look into yourself and write what you see?

hmm... I see a liver, it seems to be quite livery and such... ooh! is that a kidney! it really IS shaped like a bean! oh my... lungs, they look nicely squishy, wonder if they could work as a beanbag for a mouse? ....

I don't think that would make a very good story

how about list the ingredients that you would need to make your favorite salad?

and then ponder what would happen if the world was invaded by giant lettuce monsters who ate people by enveloping them into their leaves, which work something like the leaves of sundew plants? How would humanity defeat these horrible monsters or would we get consumed by the vegetable we so wontonly cloak with salad dressing on a daily basis? Would humans interbreed with the lettuce monsters eventually and create lettucemen? So on and so forth...

 

[Oberon]

The person before I sit down to write has no idea at all what to write, and is mildly panicky at the thought of writing. But the person sitting down, just looks into himself and writes what he sees.

I think that's the entire explanation for your posting history here, Victor. It's just that succinct.

 

[miss fortune]

I think that's the entire explanation for your posting history here, Victor. It's just that succinct.

I've NEVER read about his liver yet

 

[Totenkindly]

I've NEVER read about his liver yet

Next exercise:
Give yourself 30 seconds and make a list of things you can find in Victor's abdomen. (example: liver, heard, spleen, navel, last night's dinner, bottle of Tums, etc..

Now write a scene that is as far removed from Victor's abdomen (or abdomen-like) as possible.
(example: in a New York deli, in the mind of a demented junkyard dog in love, from the perspective of a 20th century man who is falling from an airplane and has 12 seconds to live, an online MBTI forum, etc.)


EDIT: Back to seriousness... On occasion I can write like Victor. And sometimes I just get one idea and it powerkegs off many other ideas and it's an explosion that I have to rush to capture. Other times I really have to do exercises to "trigger" a thought. And so there you can see the pattern -- I need a kernel of SOMETHING to respond to. I'm a responder and reactor.

I know people who actually benefit from being very structured when writing. We are all different.

 

[Mole]

Because not everyone works like you do.

But of course, dear Jennifer, they should.

 

[Mole]

I'm a responder and reactor.

And you respond to me, and you respond very well.

 

[Mole]

I think that's the entire explanation for your posting history here, Victor. It's just that succinct.

And that's the perfect word, "succinct".

And I do try to be succinct in spite of being told I am incomprehensible.

 

[Mole]

I've NEVER read about his liver yet

I find I do actually like my tummy. I don't know why. But its a nice tummy - a bit like the tummy of a teddy bear.

 

[Mole]

Isn't it easier to write when you have something in your head to write down? People frequently write books about their experience or articles about something they have uncovered. I figure that if you're writing creatively, you need something in your head before you can do it? Even the most creative and original art had to be inspired by a collection of memories and information. You can't force something from nothing, your head would explode! So fill your head with experience, knowledge, advice or random crap.

I think that's the secret - to have nothing in my head, so my imagination can have free rein.

Indeed if I wish to suspend your disbelief, I must first suspend mine.

So I fully imagine something then just write down what I see.

 

[Totenkindly]

And you respond to me, and you respond very well.

...I do, don't I?

I find I do actually like my tummy. I don't know why. But its a nice tummy - a bit like the tummy of a teddy bear.

The soft stuffy fluff inside a teddy bear's tummy, or the warm furry fuzz outside?

(I think if this thread is about Writer's Block, there will be lots of things here to respond to!)

 

[miss fortune]

Teddy Ruxpin?

(oh no! I've just demonstrated my age quite nicely )

 

[Mole]

...I do, don't I?

And it is very nice to have you respond to me, just as others like you to respond to them.

Responsiveness is a gift, and it seems you are gifted.

 

[SolitaryWalker]

I don't know why you have writer's block, I don't, for when I sit down to write I become a different person.

The person before I sit down to write has no idea at all what to write, and is mildly panicky at the thought of writing. But the person sitting down, just looks into himself and writes what he sees.

I must admit I am mildly annoyed with you - why don't you just look into yourself and write what you see?

I'm sure you wouldn't 'write what you see' if you gave your posts a moment's worth of thought before hitting the 'submit' button. Writer's block would seem like something much more common to you then.

 

[Mole]

Feeling the Fear

I'm sure you wouldn't 'write what you see' if you gave your posts a moment's worth of thought before hitting the 'submit' button. Writer's block would seem like something much more common to you then.

Of course, if I thought about what I was to write, I wouldn't write anything.

Fortunately, I don't write the words rather the words write me.

I write down one word and listen to what is says, then I write down that. Then the two words have a conversation and I listen to their conversation.

Just as you and I are having a conversation and I listen to that.

And the essence of conversation is spontaneity.

But if we were to think before we converse, we would kill spontaneity.

Of course spontaneity is frightening, and to forestall the fear some of us think before we converse.

But if we feel the fear, spontaneity becomes possible.