Force yourself
I have a recurring daily task that simply says “force yourself to brainstorm article ideas for 25 minutes”. This reminder pings me every single day when I get home from work. The idea behind it is to not merely look at it and say to myself, “well, I don’t really have any ideas, so I will just check it off and try again tomorrow.” Oh, no. The idea of “forcing myself” brings about a sort of rage and stubbornness inside. For the most part, people can’t stand being told what to do. So use this as a way to motivate yourself to action. Get mad and start writing.
Write, no matter what
Even if you think you don’t have enough time, are too tired, did too much work, have no ideas, whatever. It all doesn’t matter and it’s probably bullshit anyways. The only way to keep writing is to keep writing. We have talked about the 750 words a day habit that everyone (even non-writers) should keep to invoke creativity and flow in our lives. Making yourself write 750 words a day is a good first step to beat writer’s block one day at a time. As you keep writing more and more the ideas like “I don’t have any ideas” and “I’ll just write tomorrow” go out the window. We have to make a habit of writing consistently, no matter what.
Embrace bad ideas
Are you not writing because your ideas suck? Yeah, well, join the club. Most ideas for writing (or anything for that matter) aren’t very good. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t embrace them and try to run with them. Keep a list of all of your ideas and start writing about them even if you think they are completely horrible. It’s a challenging thing to do; writing about something that you think is a bad idea. But, what can happen while writing is that your bad idea takes a turn into a better one and then possibly into something you never thought it would get to. It’s hard work to write through bad ideas, but the practice of it will surely break writer’s block and even help you produce some awesome content that is worth your time.
Write about uncomfortable things
Here at Lifehack and my site DevBurner I tend to write about productivity and technology. These topics can be sometimes personal, but nothing like hunkering down and writing about my personal life, my feelings, what I can’t stand about myself or about the people around me, etc. Writing about the tough things in life can bring about ideas that you can use elsewhere. You also get to learn about yourself in the process and by doing that can sometimes see why you get writer’s block in the first place.
Publish something everyday
This combines all of the above ways to beat writer’s block into one. Get a personal blog, Tumblr, whatever and publish something every single day, no matter what. This is a tactic that I haven’t implemented yet, but what it does is get you in the habit of writing about anything and everything, embracing and trying out different/bad ideas, and to not take yourself so seriously. Yes, you may be criticized, laughed at, scoffed at, whatever. You can make the site anonymous if you like. What you may find is that you produce something fabulous that people can look up to you for and that you can be proud of. You may be able to take this daily content and put together a book or spin it off into another site. It doesn’t really matter. Publishing everyday is a great way to beat writer’s block the hard way.
Conclusion
Writer’s block is a pain in the ass. So, instead of being afraid of it and letting it control you, it’s time to fight back and be a pain in the ass to writer’s block. These ways to beat writer’s block aren’t easy, but they work. They do take time and dedication but in my experience (and many other’s) it’s the only way to keep yourself writing for the long run. (Photo credit: pen and notebook via Shutterstock)
