Think Outside the Writer's Block Box

Let's face it: when you're suffering with Writer's Block, you're in a box. You might feel like there's no way out, not a ray of light, and you're suffocating. The good news is that you've probably built that box or placed yourself in it. Blocks are usually constructed within your own mind. Do you really have to be there? Can you change the material, bend the bars, open a window?

This reminds me of my early art experiences with big, fat waxy crayons and printed books of images I was expected to fill in with colors. If the print had been more faint, the cute kittens and puppies would have disappeared into the background, because I was unable to STAY INSIDE THE LINES! I was more interested in what might be happening in the background, because I knew puppies and kitties didn't just hang in featureless space. Coloring outside the lines is thinking outside the box.

One of the best examples I know about writing is the recent development of memoir writing. Prior to the late 1980s, life story writers were constrained by the limitations of autobiography or personal essay. Then some brave souls broke out of those box/blocks to run free with tense and voice and time, mingling then and now, the person I was with the person I am, the tale with the teller. Thinking outside that traditional box was coloring outside the lines, making for a richer, layered, more colorful creation.