Writer's Block Book: The Commitment

A swift or slow perusal of past posts reveals the most popular and passionate ones, as measured by comments, are about Writer's Block. I'm thinking it's about time to gather these and tie them together into a coherent bundle. This will most likely take the form of another e-Book, easy to download.

Although logic and logistics can cause Writer's Block, the most common sources are psychological. And there I'm more than qualified to comment, to offer explanations and advice. I don't mean to lean on my two degrees in psychology, either, but also on my intimate understanding of fighting fears. Yes, I have generalized anxiety, a fear of everything, even of being afraid. I suspect many writers suffer this in one form or another or from agoraphobia or social anxiety. I know the paralysis of analysis and the funk of fear.

The confusing aspect of fear and Writer's Block comes about because fears are multiple and can be expressed in so many different forms. If you don't believe that, just consider how many types of phobias exist. The referenced list includes "graphophobia" (writing) and "scriptophobia" (writing in public) Seriously, I don't think that those contribute to Writer's Block.

When fears aren't attached to a particular object or situation as with phobias, they are called "anxiety". For writers, it is easy for anxiety to focus on the instruments, location, or the action of trying to create writing. The specific fear can involve criticism, disapproval, rejection, or the opposite, success, which would thrust the writer into a spotlight, attract attention, require a performance before others.

For some, the causes are deeper and more complex. I don't want to go all psychoanalytic on you here but if the ending of the unconscious script of your life reads "failure", then your unconscious will force you to make decisions and to act in ways that sabotage success. O.K., Dr. Freud will leave the room now.

Having written this post and released it to the universe, I have taken the scary step of committing myself to this project. It could fail. Correction, I could fail. What's the worst that could happen if I fail? I will have spent time in a labor of love that is reward enough in itself.