Thursday, October 14, 2010

The bumpy road of Writerland

Have you ever felt like you were driving down the smooth highway of Writerland when the road suddenly became rocky? Or maybe a roadblock came up?




When I hit a rough spot in my writing, I procrastinate. I do everything I can to avoid writing, and lately I've been reading suspenseful romance novels. Why romance novels? They are simple to follow and an easy read, the plot is typically not too in depth, plus it takes very few brain cells to be entertained. Added to that, emotions usually don't get involved.



But I don't stop brainstorming in those procrastination moments. My mind works through what is to come in my plot. I'll even make notes about scenes I want to write or nice dialogue that my characters spew into my brain. My characters usually don't shut up and that's perfectly fine with me. But sometimes I feel like this adorable puppy:



I know the non-writing moments will pass very soon and the road will once again be smooth. What about you? What do you do when your writing car hits a rut?

7 comments:

NiaRaie said...

I do the same thing. Read books that don't require a lot of brain power and turn on Netflix. If nothing else, I'll eventually become inspired by good or bad writing from those media.

Lydia Kang said...

Reading always helps. And checking blogs is always a fun escapism, but somehow it usually inspires me to get back to writing1

Jemmichanga said...

Procrastination has turned me into a blog-addict! I'll read a blog from beginning to end and then move onto the next just to avoid working through a difficult paragraph/scene/chapter!

Amie Kaufman said...

If I'm genuinely hitting a bump, then I try and break the pattern--I read, I go for a walk, I watch something fun on TV, whatever will change my brainwaves. If I just want to procrastinate, then I force myself into 15 minutes of writeordie.com before I let myself stop--usually turns out I can produce some words after all! Also, that puppy slays me. So cute.

Jamie Blair said...

OH those bumps. I didn't think Jenn The Plot Queen hit plot bumps! ;)

J.S. Wood said...

Thanks for the comments. I never think of reading blogs since that's not something I usually do.

Jamie: lol. It's not the plot, it's the boredom of writing details. That sounds so terrible.

Brandi Bain said...

I seem to hit road blocks even when I'm just editing, not necessarily just writing the details of the plot. I think it's boredom on my part and that my road block is more procrastination than anything else. I love to read when I'm truly procrastinating about writing, or if I'm not feeling very creative, I will work on one of my short stories. I have a couple of those that I write more for the act of writing and really don't plan to do anything with them if and when I finish them. Sometimes just writing anything motivates me to start writing again on my more hopeful stories.