Writer’s block – those two words are enough to strike fear into the heart of any writer. That frustrating feeling of being stuck, unable to come up with ideas or put words on the page, is a common experience for writers of all levels. Whether you’re a professional writer on deadline or a student staring at a blank screen for a term paper, writer’s block can bring your progress to a screeching halt.
But fear not, dear writers! There are plenty of techniques to overcome writer’s block and get those creative juices flowing again. In this article, we’ll explore various strategies to defeat the dreaded block and reignite your writing spark. Get ready to vanquish that blinking cursor once and for all.
Understand the Root Causes
Before we dive into solutions, it’s helpful to understand what might be causing your writer’s block in the first place. Writer’s block can stem from many sources – perfectionism, fear, lack of motivation, distractions, or simply being out of creative Steam. Sometimes the cause is external factors like work stress or personal crises. Other times, it’s an internal mindset issue.
By identifying potential root causes, you can better select the techniques to overcome your specific brand of writer’s block. If perfectionism is the culprit, reframing your mindset may help. If it’s an external situation creating the block, separating writing from life’s distractions could provide relief.
Knowing the “why” behind your block makes it much easier to apply an effective remedy. So do a little self-reflection on what might be holding you back before strategizing.
Try Free-Writing
One of the most effective ways to break through writer’s block is to simply start writing – anything and everything, with no censorship. The free-writing technique involves opening a new document and writing without stopping for a set period of time (10–15 minutes). You don’t need to follow any rules of grammar or even make sense. The goal is to turn off your inner critic and unleash an uninhibited stream of consciousness onto the page.
This exercise can help silence your inner editor, that often contributes to creative anxiety. It builds momentum and gets words flowing again, even if they’re incoherent rambling at first. When staring at a blank page, it’s harder for perfectionists to get started. But once you have words on the page, it kickstarts your creativity in a judgment-free zone.
After your free-writing session ends, you can look back at what you’ve written, searching for interesting seedling ideas that can blossom into something more. Building from a base of uninhibited rambling, you’ll likely find threads to pursue further through more focused writing.
Don’t Break the Chain
There’s an oft-cited productivity technique where you get a wall calendar and put an X over every day you complete a task like writing, going to the gym, or paying bills. After a few weeks, you’ll have a chain of X’s forming – and you’ll be motivated not to break that satisfying chain.
This simple trick can be exceptionally helpful for overcoming writer’s block. By committing to writing at least a little bit every single day, even for just 10-15 minutes, you prevent dry spells from spiraling into full-blown blocks. When you refuse to let a blank day create a break in your chain, you’ll find yourself generating ideas, musings, or rough drafts simply to uphold the daily habit.
Set a small but consistent goal, like writing 200–300 words per day minimum, and use a physical or digital calendar to track your chain. Breaking writer’s block often comes from establishing sustainable habits. Short, daily writing sessions provide a flow of possible ideas to expand upon later.
Change Your Environment
Sometimes, to break free from writer’s block, you need to change your physical surroundings. Our minds can too easily get stuck in routines and environments that lend themselves to stagnation.
If you normally write at home, pack up and try a new creative space like a coffee shop, library, park, or coworking space. A shift in scenery provides new stimuli for your senses, which can jumpstart creativity. If weather permits, take your writing outdoors where you can feel sunlight and fresh air—simple sensations that help unlock new perspectives.
You can also change more subtle environmental factors like background music, ambient sound, or room lighting. Or make more drastic modifications like upgrading your writing area with live plants, inspiring artwork, or uplifting organization. By altering your creative space, it’s easier to alter your creative mindset as well.
Expose Yourself to Fresh Input
When you’re stuck on what to write about, sometimes the best solution is seeking out new information and experiences as building blocks for your creativity.
If you normally read a certain genre, try exploring different styles of writing, fiction or non-fiction, that are outside your comfort zone. The unique voices, plots, and perspectives could plant seeds for new ideas. Attend a lecture, go to a museum, see a play, or watch a documentary in an unfamiliar field—any activity to expose your mind to unknown concepts that provoke original thoughts.
You can even try more creative intake methods like visiting an interesting shop, taking a class in an offbeat topic, watching TED Talks, or chatting with a friend who has diverse interests. The human mind is wired for innovative combination, so grafting new stimuli onto your internal knowledge base can yield brilliant buddings of creative thought.
Take a Break Sometimes, the block is so frustrating and persistent that your best move is to temporarily walk away. Yes, you heard that right – stop writing altogether… for a little while.
By taking a break from writing for a few days or even a week, you create space to recharge your mental batteries and return with a fresh creative mindset. Our brains only have so much focused energy before needing to step back. Attempting to force creativity when you’re tapped out often backfires by compounding the block instead.
Use this period to participate in leisure activities that make you happy and fulfilled. Go to movies, restaurants, hikes—whatever sparks some joy. Just don’t dwell on writing projects or sources of block anxiety. Allow your imagination to rest fully before jumping back into your work, renewed and reinvigorated.
Keep an Idea Journal
Having a dedicated space for recording fleeting ideas is an invaluable tool for any writer looking to defeat blocks before they even form. Our brains often make inspired connections at the most unexpected times—while showering, exercising, or even falling asleep. If we don’t capture that inspiration immediately, the idea can easily evaporate into the ether.
Keep a small journal or digital notes app solely devoted to jotting down any seedling premise or concept as soon as it emerges, no matter how incomplete or rough. These ideas can serve as creative prompts or fodder for full-fledged works later on. Even fragments like a unique character trait, snatches of dialogue, or attention-grabbing scenarios are worthwhile entries in your idea journal.
Having a repository of fresher spontaneous thoughts available can help combat future writer’s block by providing fertile jumping-off points for further development.
Read Other Writers
Sometimes the most helpful solution for writer’s block is immersing yourself in excellent writing again. Pick up a particularly gripping book you’ve been wanting to read, or revisit a beloved classic that has brought you inspiration before. As you read through engaging stories, passages, or essays, take notes on what made them stand out – clever turns of phrase, unique narrative devices, vivid sensory details.
For writers, reading deeply can have a similar effect on creativity as exposure to brand new input. Your mind starts internalizing the rhythms and artistic devices that enthralled you in the first place. That process awakens your innate storytelling facilities and reminds you why you love the craft so much.
Discussing works with other writers or joining a reading group can enhance this effect even more. Intellectual discourse stokes your creative fire like few other activities can.
Write Anything
If you’re truly stuck on producing your desired written work, take a step back and write something—anything at all. Compose blog posts about your hobbies, journal about your day, draft silly short stories – basically anything to apply the fundamentals of writing without judging its ultimate use. The act of flexing your expressive abilities can loosen the creative logjam, even if the writing isn’t toward your original project.
Many writers find that drafting instructional pieces on topics they’re knowledgeable about is an excellent writer’s block workaround. Adopting an authoritative, explanatory tone removes the artistic performance pressure while still making progress on the craft. This frees you up to produce pages of solid writing output while disentangling any emotional baggage about the quality. Moving past the block becomes a matter of momentum.
Change the Work Order
A novel or major writing project typically follows a certain thread of narrative progression, with scenes and chapters ideally flowing into each other. But when struggling with writer’s block, flipping that expected sequence can help unlock new perspectives.
Instead of trying (and failing) to work chronologically through your plot, try jumping around to later sections that feel easier to explore at the moment. Or draft scenes without immediate chronological context. You can always restructure the work order later – overcoming the block takes precedence.
The same goes for non-sequential projects. If you’re working on a book of essays or a collection of short stories, resist the urge to rigidly follow an imposed table of contents. Maybe attacking a chapter eight or eleven is your best path forward right now. Focus on refreshing your creative flow, not necessarily optimized efficiency.
Role Play
Sometimes seeing your writing through fresh eyes is exactly what’s needed to kick writer’s block to the curb. One way to achieve that is by role-playing as your characters in real life.
For fiction writers, assume the persona of a character—their mannerisms, attitudes, speech patterns, any defining quirks – and act out how they’d respond to everyday scenarios not necessarily in your story’s narrative context. Have an imaginary conversation as them at the bank, grocery store, or dog park. This exercise helps deepen your connection with these personas while bringing them more dimensionally to life.
You can also try roleplaying as third-party narrators – adopting an omniscient, all-seeing tone while describing random happenings around you. How might your eloquent narrator conveyan amusing street scene, bizarre overheard dialogue, or even a person’s interior monologue? Stepping outside yourself lets you reimagine how to transport readers into different perspectives and settings.
The point is using your immediate surroundings and real-time experiences as an avenue to channel your narrative voice and characterization skills. Once those creative faculties are activated, they’re much easier to redirect back toward your written work.
Get Physical Exercise
This may sound counterintuitive, but physically moving your body is a proven method for breaking cycles of writer’s block and stagnation. Exercise boosts blood flow, activates different parts of your brain, and provides refreshing mental clarity.
Going for a short walk, run, bike ride, or even just some jumping jacks can be the breath of fresh air your creativity requires after being hunched over a desk. This movement interjects new stimuli, changes your environment (as discussed earlier), and helps reset your frame of mind.
Many professional writers schedule regular exercise breaks right into their routines. That intentional pause from staring at a blinking cursor gives their overheated brains a chance to recharge, returning them to the page with reinvigorated energy and new pathways for idea generation.
Writer’s block comes with the territory of being a wordsmith – it’s going to happen eventually. But knowing how to push through those inevitable dips and valleys will make you a better, more resilient creative in the long run.
Try out different combinations of techniques like free-writing, idea journaling, reading inspiration, and physical activity. Track what works best for you and keep those methods on hand when you start feeling stuck. Let snags motivate you toward finding increasingly ingenious workarounds.
Most importantly, be patient with yourself and resist the urge to spiral when writer’s block persists. It’s a very natural part of the creative process, occurring even to the most veteran and talented writers. As long as you stay committed to experimenting with fresh solutions, your next stroke of brilliance is never too far away. Those pages are just waiting to be filled—you’ve got this!