Is there anyone else who feels like they have so much to say/write but when you get down to actually writing it down, there's a block? What would be your advice for beginners who want to start writing?

I hate block. My best friend and I are writers and are both in a huge block right now. I really like to get into the moment when I write, to feel what my characters feel, but in a block, I can't quite reach that. But lately, I've found that lightening up on myself helps. When I read my earliest work, it sucks, it's terrible, it's awful writing--but I wrote a lot, and the basic ideas aren't that bad, and I can definitely build off them later. So I put the barest minimum, as if I was explaining what happened in a movie to someone who hasn't seen it. Sometimes, I can settle into the flow a bit and get some decent writing in, and when I get stuck on a word, I just put a synonym or basic description of the word in brackets and come back to it later so I don't stop writing.

I don't get much done this way, but a little is better than nothing, and it's easier to start with a little when you come back to it than to start with nothing again. I don't write on a deadline and have plenty of time for this, which is why I can do it. No idea how writers who publish on a deadline do it. But I did read one day that scheduling a time every day, even if you don't do anything but still carve out that time and don't do anything else, can help teach youre brain that this is writing time, to help make it a habit. I kinda do that, too.

But in all my years of writing, the most important thing I've found when it comes to blocks is that they're all different. We all write differently and for different reasons, and likewise the blocks are different and for different reasons, and the way to break it will be different. I've read so much advice for writing or breaking blocks that just don't work. So be kind to yourself. You write for your reason, not for my reason, so your block breaker will be yours, not mine. Try out different people's methods, or mix different methods. Eventually, something will work. I am just now crawling out of a block that lasted about a decade. A full decade of almost zero writing (certainly zero on the stuff I wanted to write). It was awful. But I finally found the system that works for me. You'll find yours. Just give yourself time :)

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