Professional Strategies Against Writer's Block
Tips and insights from 26 well-known authors, bloggers, professional writers
It can affect experienced journalists just as much as it can affect engineers who are just about to deliver a project report to management: writer's block. The blank page - nowadays usually the empty monitor - becomes a threat. What can you do about it? How do professionals deal with it? I asked colleagues, journalists, bloggers and authors what strategies they use.
How did this article come about? At an event on the sidelines of the chinese america data Frankfurt Book Fair, I was asked several times whether I sometimes get writer's block and, if so, how I deal with it. Back at my desk, I had the idea of simply asking around in my network what professional writers do when they get writer's block - and what they advise others who suffer from it. Here are some great tips and surprising insights from 26 well-known colleagues. At the very end, my own statement.
Strategies of professional writers against writer's block
Table of contents
Strategies of professional writers against writer's block
"Soon deadline helps"
"Not at the last minute"
"Conversations and Nature Experiences"
“Research, write, let it rest”
“Sounds simple – and it is”
“Once the ice is broken, the fear disappears”
"Like a liberation"
"Exercising your writing muscles"
"1. Bite, 2. Bite, 3. Bite"
"Don't panic"
"Think of a nice metaphor"
"Be inspired by others"
"Setting sentences in motion with mischief"
"Recharge your creative battery"
“Enough time is the best prophylaxis”
"First bring calm into it"
"My trick: set deadlines"
"I work best under pressure"
"Look at it from a different perspective"
“Do! – and raise awareness of the background”
“How do I create writing flow?”
"My solution: a mind map"
"There must be a plan"
"Two approaches: change or coercion"
"7 tips against the 'blank sheet'"
"Go for a quick run"
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"Soon deadline helps"
Ulrike Langer, media journalist
I don't really have any "real" writer's block. If I can't write smoothly, then I know that I Ulrike Langer on writer's blockhaven't done enough research or that my initial thesis or the internal logic isn't right. There's nothing I can do to smooth this out linguistically. I then have to really get back to it and think again. If everything is right, I often write my texts quite quickly.
I used to often have a block when getting started. Now I just write the first thing that comes to mind. Most of the time it stays that way because the first thought is often the best. If not, a better way to start will emerge later when I'm writing. That's the nice thing about writing programs: nothing is set in stone.