Fear of a Blank Screen

We are just over the halfway point of NaNoWriMo. If you’re pacing along at 1,667 words a day, you should be at 26,000+ by the end of the day.

How’s it going?

If you’re like me, maybe you’ve encountered the Fear of the Blank Screen. When the juices aren’t flowing it can be so hard to stare at that white expanse. I hit a loss of momentum this week. I just didn’t have energy for my story. How do you pull yourself out of a lull? Here some strategies I came up with:

• What excited you about this project in the first place?
• Is there a secret that your main character is hiding from you? Ask her.
• Try writing the backstory of a character. It may not make it into your final draft, but maybe it will spark something. If you feel you’ve got the backstory down for your main characters, try a secondary character.
• If you’re moving through your outline in strict sequential order try jumping ahead to a scene that excites you.
• Try writing a scene in a different voice. If you’re using first person, try third and vice versa. Write the scene from someone else’s perspective.
• Take a break and read a myth or a fairy tale. How might you incorporate something from your reading into your story?
• What’s a quality of your character that you haven’t expressed yet? Is there a personality trait that you haven’t explored yet? Write a new scene that dives into this trait, perhaps something that shows a contradiction in their personality.
• Revisit your outline. Does it still make sense? Is something out of place or missing? Some discontinuity in the outline may be contributing to your block.

I tried several of these techniques and I found it was the last one about the outlining that cleared my blocks. I had some undefined territory in my plot. Once I got some clarity there, the muse started speaking to me again.

Let us know how you get unstuck.

Still stuck? Let’s get you out of it! I want to help.

In the comments below, let me know what you’re struggling with and I’ll provide some coaching right here to get you unstuck. Let’s do this!