3 Ways Distance Creeps Into Deep POV And How To Fix It!

May 8, 2020 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 6 Comments

Deep point of view is a stylistic choice to remove the writer voice and instead write the story as though the reader is inside the character’s head. You want to remove any hints that the reader is in a chair at home reading a story instead of living out the story alongside the main character(s).

Learning to recognize when distance creeps into your story is really hard, especially if you haven’t read a lot of stories written entirely in deep point of view. It’s a tricky mindset shift that needs to happen and it’s not always intuitive.

Here’s a post on removing distance in deep pov that might be helpful if this is new to you.

I’m doing something a bit different here this week – an experiment of sorts. In my courses and in the free Facebook group, I often give feedback on a paragraph or two to help writers see where they can take their writing deeper and so many find that SUPER helpful.

I’ve been doing free one-page critiques in my free Facebook group and those who submit generously agreed to allow me to share a paragraph or two in the spirit of helping everyone go deeper! You can’t fix what you can’t see! And it happens to everyone. I still have editors and crit partners point out where I’ve let distance and telling creep into my stories and I’ve shared many of those examples here on the blog. It’s just so hard to see in your own work — not impossible, it gets easier, but it will still creep in.

Example One: What Is Being Mentally Prepared For And WHY?

Cindy, upstairs in her sitting room, flips the television off. She watches the limo enter through the gates. It winds around the bare flower beds, past the leafless dogwood trees, coasting to a slow stop at the front of the house. She smooths her wool navy and black plaid skirt down over her hips, mentally preparing for the explanation. The hem of her skirt dances around her booted ankles as she walks to the stairway. Placing one foot firmly in the center of each step, she makes her descent.

I’ve bolded where the distance as crept into the paragraph here. The goal of deep pov is for the reader to feel like they’re right there, in the room with the character privy to all their thoughts and feelings.

Gravel crunched on the driveway and Cindy flipped off the television. She stood to the side of the window and looked out, but didn’t move the lace curtains aside. The limo glided past the flower beds and coasted to a stop at the front of the house. He’d have an excuse ready. He always did. She smoothed her wool skirt over her hips and turned towards the stairs. She wouldn’t challenge his lies, but she was done believing them.

I don’t know how this writer wants this story to go, but here’s one way the distance could be removed. The reader doesn’t know what this character is mentally preparing for or WHY. Having both those elements shown (not told) would help the reader lean in and hopefully cheer for this character!

The reader, at this point, doesn’t need to know what the apology will be about, or even if her attitude is fair. It’s how this character sees the situation RIGHT NOW. Do you see a difference? Are you leaning in more to find out what happens next?

Example Two: Let The Character Live The Story Rather Than The Writer Tell A Story

After a short rest they continued toward home.
Kiri was having second thoughts about doing this again tomorrow. It wasn’t just the heat making her uncomfortable. Her cramps were getting worse. Normally fast and light on her feet, she was having trouble keeping up with Joro’s long-legged stride.

So, I’ve bolded the places where distance has crept in a bit. These are easily fixed. It’s more of a mindset shift, having the character live out the story on the page rather than the reader being told a story. Doesn’t change the story you want to tell, or even how you tell it – it changes who is telling the story is all.

What second thoughts is Kiri having? In deep pov, the reader knows everything the main character knows, but that’s ALL they know. This is fixed by writing out what her “second thoughts” are in a way that shows how she feels. The next two bolded lines feel like storytelling — the character isn’t telling the story, the writer is sharing what’s being observed and the reader is back in a theatre seat watching the story happen. Just a slight tweak puts the reader back in the action with the character.

She couldn’t make this trek again tomorrow, not in this heat. His longer stride nearly left her in the dust today and her feet would ache even worse tomorrow.

Write the story directly from the pov character’s perspective.

Example Three: The Character Shouldn’t Speak To The Reader

“I love my son. I love my son. I f–ing love my son.” I remind myself as I squint my eyes back shut for just a moment.

You see how sneaky distance is? Who is this character talking to? We want the story to come across as though the reader is on a direct IV drip from the character. Some writers intentionally break what script-writers call “the fourth wall” and talk directly to the audience, which is what this feels like, but it adds distance and is considered telling in deep pov.

“I love my son. I love my son. I f–ing love my son.” I squint my eyes back shut for just a moment.

The key for all three of these examples is to watch for when the writer voice takes over and begins telling the story. Ask – what is the character actually thinking here? Would they think that to themselves using THESE words? What’s important to this character RIGHT NOW? Edit accordingly.

Been told you should learn Deep Point Of View? Had an editor or critique partner tell you to “go deeper” with the emotions in your fiction? Looking for a community of writers seeking to create emotional connections with readers? Check out the Free Resource Hub and then join the Going Deeper With Emotions In Fiction Facebook group.

3 Basic Rules For Building A Fiction Platform On Facebook

July 25, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 3 Comments

I love to write. There are writers who write and don’t care if anyone ever reads their work. I write so my work can be read. And for that, I need readers.

Facebook remains the gorilla of social media. This has been the case for a few years now and there doesn’t seem to be any end in sight. So, when my cowriter and I sat down to plan out our marketing (yes, we’re working on marketing as we write the book), we knew Facebook had to be one of the biggest cogs in our strategy.

For the summer, I’m sharing the marketing strategy that might blow up in our faces because I don’t see many writers approaching social the way we are. (I’ll be back to focusing on Deep Point Of View in September.) Over the years, I’ve written a lot about writers using Facebook to build platform. I’ve spent the last couple of years going much deeper with Facebook and marketing with great teachers like Rachel Miller (Moolah Marketer on Facebook), Stu McLaren (Founder of Tribe – find the group here), and Warren Carlyle (he’s BIG on Instagram but uses the same principles – his group is here), and others.

Friends, I’m all about free and organic reach is NOT dead on Facebook. If you just want to pour money into ads and not work at building an engaged community (aka passionate and vocal readership) then what I’m about to post likely won’t have much value for you. That’s OK. If you’re all about the free, and nearly free, stick with me.

3 Rules Of Facebook Marketing

These are going to be overly simplified. I’m not going to waste time writing out points of strategy that no one is interested in. You all get to decide the direction of these posts.

There are three principles I keep in mind with every piece of content on Facebook. Write them on a sticky note and post it to your monitor if you want. These are important!

Facebook Loves Itself

Facebook is in the business of keeping people ON FACEBOOK. This is a problem when you want to use Facebook to direct people to a blog, a landing page, Amazon or another book retailer.

Sharing content on your page that’s already been popular on Facebook can help. Posting videos and photos natively instead of using auto crossposting capabilities built into Instagram or WordPress will help. Use Facebook’s native scheduler instead of a third party one.

Links that just point people away from Facebook will not get as much reach. They won’t. Why? Because Facebook (and Instagram) loves itself. Posting links to Youtube or other social sites will be suppressed by the algorithm. Links in general won’t do as well.

Making links one aspect of your posting strategy is one way around this. If you show Facebook you’re interesting, then the one link you post among four or six other types of content will still be seen as long as people interact with it (ie – click through to the blog or website). You need to make sure your website is Facebook friendly (think SEO, loading speed, bounce rates, etc.). Don’t use link shortners, so people can see where they’re being directed to. Also, it’s a great idea to find ways to direct people back to Facebook (for example, I’ve added links to Facebook in this post). I’ve embedded content from Facebook into blog posts as well.

Does that mean there’s no point in posting blog post links on Facebook? Nope.

Facebook Gives You More Of What You Already Have

Have you participated in mutual like-fests on Facebook? I’ve lost count of how many friend requests I’ve accepted from writers and then immediately gotten a private message asking me for a reciprocal like on their profile or page. *face palm* On the page we’re building for fantasy readers (a specific niche of fantasy readers) there will be some writers on there, but we’re focusing on attracting fans of the particular niche of fantasy we’re writing.

Facebook makes assumptions about who your audience is and will strive to give you more of what you already have – writers.

If you’ve got a bunch of fans from a country that doesn’t speak English and you only write in English, that’s a problem. If you have a bunch of fans from a country where they can’t even buy your book if they wanted to, that’s a problem. If your mom asked all her senior friends to like your author page but you’re writing to 20 and 30-somethings, that’s a problem. Facebook will give you more of what you already have.

Know who your audience is. Know how old they are. Know where they live. Know as much about them as you can – because Facebook will give you more of what you already have. It’s better to have 100 or 1000 fans who LOVE your work and comment, like, and share your content than 10,000 who ignore your posts and never interact with your content. Don’t get caught up in numbers, focus on building a community. Our goal is to have 1000 passionate readers who LOVE our fantasy niche by launch day. We do plan to run ads on a minimal spend ($1 – $2 a day).

Communities are made up of people who talk with one another, encourage one another, support one another, tell all their friends about this great community they’ve found, etc.

Facebook Wants People To Feel Good

Facebook is implementing what they call community standards because they want people to feel safe while on their platform. Which gets tricky because everyone has different levels of comfort when it comes to health conditions, sexual content/imagery, politics, issues like vaccinations, etc. So it means that maybe some content you’re OK with seeing, Facebook has decided it doesn’t like.

Post content that makes people look good. Reframe the questions you ask and the images you post so that when people share it they can smile – this is so me! Don’t frame content in such a way that makes people look or feel bad.

Instead of: Don’t be the loser stuck at home this weekend try 10 fun ways to get out and meet people. Of course you’re going to find popular examples of negativity, but there’s a viral tipping point that needs to happen and it’s rare.

The community standards are hitting some romance and fantasy authors hard because they know what sells their books and Facebook has said it doesn’t like that imagery (I think Amazon may be swinging in this direction also). Romance readers and fantasy readers may love man-chests, chainmaille bikinis, and sexy images, but Facebook does not.

And I’m not just talking about blatantly sexual books covers, but imagery that shows or implies any sexual content – consensual or not (ie. the sexy embraces even when fully clothed, hands on breasts or hips or buttocks, etc.) are listed among those Facebook has specifically stated will be suppressed or removed. The algorithm is supposed to know the difference between a photo of a nude statue in a museum and a porn photo, but it’s a computer. There’s too much content being posted to have a human pair of eyes see it all. Controversy is not a great strategy on Facebook.

Starting A Platform From Scratch

I started posting content on my PROFILE (where people are asked to become a friend) that would attract fantasy readers. I asked questions and started conversations because I was looking for people willing to interact on Facebook not just passively lurk with a like. Lurkers are great, they buy books too, but I need my first 100 fans to be really passionate fans of fantasy to get the free organic reach on Facebook.

I created a friend list and added the people who liked that content to it. They can’t see that I’ve added them to any list. It’s a way to segment my friends. When I reached the number I wanted on that list (so this took time, it wasn’t a one-post and I’m done strategy), I created the fantasy page (there was an entire strategy behind that) and then posted content ONLY for the people on that list to encourage them to like the new page.

My cowriter has one fantasy novel out already and has a small email list from that book. We knew those were our ideal passionate readers already, so we created a free survey on Survey Monkey. We crafted the questions in such a way so that they TOLD US what they wanted to see in terms of content on Facebook, how to target ads to find others like them on Facebook and Amazon, etc. I also shared the survey, but only to the segmented friend list of people who had already shown that they loved to read fantasy. We didn’t want non-fantasy readers skewing our results.

Yes – they told us what they wanted us to post. No more guessing. No more posting content that attracts the wrong people. They told us exactly what they loved to see, what they hated, and why.

We built a Facebook, marketing and Amazon strategy on that survey! We created a Facebook page targeted to our ideal readers and have a 200% organic reach there right now (granted, we have fewer than 100 people on there because we are still in soft launch phase).

Want to see the 10 questions we asked? Get those here.

Remember – those reading this short series get to direct these posts. What aspect of this platform-building strategy would you like to know more about? Share below and I’ll get really specific on the topics people are interested in.

5 Day Deep Point Of View Challenge 2019

February 26, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 2 Comments

Want to create an emotional connection between your characters and readers? Tired of beta readers and editors telling you to go deeper? Can’t find the right emotional tension between blase and melodrama? You need deep point of view.

What Is Deep Point of View?

Deep point of view is a writing style, a technique, that aims to put the reader IN THE STORY with your characters, experiencing everything the POV character experiences in real time. When you remove all the distance between the reader and the story, remove all the filters between the writer and the story, the reader gets an emotional journey they’ll never forget and want to tell all their friends about.

5 Day Deep Point Of View Challenge

Next Date: tba

The 5 Day Deep Point Of View Challenge ran in March 2019, but will happen again this year.. It is hosted in a closed Facebook group where you’ll be able to watch a live video (yes, they’re recorded) of a lesson and a small bit of homework you can share with the group and get feedback on.

What Will You Learn?

The 5 Day Deep POV Challenge is a taste of the Method Acting For Writers Masterclass I teach. This was the content for the March 2019 challenge, it changes up each time it’s run.

Day 1 – Shifting How We Tell Stories

Day 2 – Understanding The Why

Day 3 – Identifying Filter and Distance

Day 4 – Adding Emotional Depth With Setting

Day 5 – Creating Emotional Arcs

Now, at first glance not all of these seem directly applicable to deep point of view. But here’s the thing, understanding deep point of view isn’t just learning some style techniques and tricks, learning where to bend the rules, or even what kind of story you’re writing — it’s a shift in HOW we tell stories. It’s not a difficult concept to understand, but it’s not intuitive and it takes a lot of practice.

And writing is such a solitary pursuit. Why not take this chance to learn with a group of people just as dedicated to taking their writing to the next level as you are!

Deep Point of View: First Person Or Third Person POV

January 29, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 7 Comments

Is it better or does it create more emotional connection to write fiction in first or third person? Does genre matter? Can I use multiple POVS? Am I worried about the wrong things?

Is First Person Or Third Person Better?

This is one of the most common questions I get asked when I’m running my Method Acting For Writers class on writing in deep point of view. There’s a long answer and a short answer.

The Short Answer:

What do you feel more comfortable writing? Don’t get caught up in the first or third person dilemma – it’s a red herring. I’ve never heard a reader tell me they decided not to read a story that intrigued them because it was written in one or the other. Readers want well-told stories.

The Long Answer:

The question of first or third can be a question of genre. YA novels lately have been trending towards first person POV. Many romance genres also seem to be trending lately towards first person. That said, there are examples in those genres of authors using third person. Most of the fantasy novels I’ve read recently have been in third person, but your experience may be different.

Most writers seem to feel one POV comes more naturally to them than the other. So stick with that until you’re proficient and have a couple of titles under your belt. Some stories seem to lend themselves better to one POV style than another as well. You may find yourself writing in third for one novel, and the next writing in first.

First Person Isn’t Necessarily In Deep Point Of View

One of the common misperceptions I find is that writers assume a story written in first person POV must be written in deep POV. Not so. Some writers are able to write first person POV and still make use to distance and other techniques that would be considered “telling” in deep POV. I find this more commonly in literary fiction genres. To be clear, this isn’t wrong. It’s a stylistic choice.

“I wore a black suit and a white shirt, a black tie and black shoes, all polished and shiny: clothes that normally would make me feel uncomfortable, as if I were in a stolen uniform or pretending to be an adult. Today, they gave me comfort of a kind. I was wearing the right clothes for a hard day.” The Ocean At The End Of The Lane: A Novel, Neil Gaiman

So, this isn’t in deep POV because there’s too much distance between the character and the reader. The character is “telling a story” as opposed to living out a story and letting the reader experience it vicariously. There’s a filter applied that wouldn’t be present in deep point of view. It’s a stylistic choice.

Writing Deep POV In Third Person Isn’t Harder

If writing in third person has always been what comes naturally to you, then writing in third deep POV will become just as natural. There is a learning curve, that comes with learning deep POV, but it’s just as effective in third person as in first.

“Heart hammering, he lurched upright in bed. Sweat drenched the front of his T-shirt and plastered his hair to his temples…He squinted against the early morning sunlight and groaned. Another dream. Another ridiculous dream.” Dreamlander, K.M. Weiland

You Don’t Have To Stick To ALL The Rules

I think it’s important to learn the rules of a writing technique. Learn the parameters of deep point of view so that you understand why specific techniques are employed, what effect the writer is trying to create by using them. Once you understand that, you can flex the rules a little so that they work for you. Lots of writers employ a version of deep point of view that breaks some rules and follows others.

Game of Thrones is one that immediately comes to mind. George R. R. Martin isn’t constrained by the “rules” of deep point of view. He uses speech tags, he uses telling in certain places, he allows distance to creep in more than a strict deep point of view technique would call for. Does it matter? Not really. His storytelling is still compelling and emotionally rich. How many people have given up on the series because the character *they loved* was killed off? They wouldn’t stop reading if they didn’t care – a lot!

The important thing is to be consistent and always get an editor and/or beta readers to give specific feedback on whether the effects you’re trying to create are working.

But What Do You Recommend?

This is the inevitable next question when I refuse to tell people what to do. *grin* I’m still not going to tell you what to do, but if it’s helpful here’s my personal preference.

Third person is more flexible than first person. Not everyone agrees with me on this and that’s fine. If first person comes to you more naturally than third person, then go with that. I don’t write in first person for the following reasons.

I write entirely in deep point of view, so I use this technique like a camera lens for the story and I’m the director. As the director, I can use a variety of camera techniques and angles to heighten interest and tension. I can use a wide shot to give a sense of the bigger picture, zoom in to a small group of people, zoom in to just one person, zoom in so you can see the character’s sweat. I never violate POV, but by adding small amounts of distance, filtering, or telling, third person lets me adjust the zoom on deep point of view to create specific effects strategically.

This means that writing in third person allows me to flex the rules a little – like Martin does with Game of Thrones (which is also written in third person). I find first person more difficult and confining in terms of a storytelling vehicle — but your mileage with this last bit of advice may vary.

Do you prefer to write in third or first person POV? Have you read novels in both first and third person deep POV?

4 Questions To Ask To Avoid Info Dumps In Deep Point Of View

January 25, 2019 by Lisa Hall-Wilson 4 Comments

No one likes reading an info dump, but we writers justify their existence because we’re sure the reader needs all this background information here, right now. Info dumps kill the pace and tension in your story and readers may just put down your book and walk away forever.

What Is An Info Dump?

“An info dump is a very large amount of information, usually backstory, supplied all at once in a narrative.” Backstory is important and vital to any character and story, but the reader doesn’t necessarily need to know all of what you know or have created. As any good introvert knows, people have to earn the trust to be told your entire lifestory, you don’t just verbally vomit on a stranger. It’s rude. *smile*

Concerning Hobbits…

In an omniscient point of view, the kind of worldbuilding Tolkien used in The Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit is acceptable. Omniscient point of view though is largely out of favor with modern readers and acquisition editors.

It’s hard to ground the reader in time and place without frontloading a work with all the ways that world is different from our own world/reality/time/place. Whether you’re writing Steampunk, Space Opera, Edwardian romance, spec fic, etc etc — the key is to avoid large deposits of information and let the world unfold for the reader as the character sees it. If everyone in your story world is green with large antennae, construct an organic scenario that would cause your character to notice it — because we don’t often think/comment on things that seem every day or ordinary.

An Info Dump: Cassandra kept her claws rounded and painted which showed her pride in her appearance. The green-skinned passersby didn’t give her any notice. They kept their long antennae gleaming and straight. Her people were fastidious and prided themselves on their appearances. Not being noticed was a good thing.

Organic Worldbuilding: Cassandra examined the filed ends of her claws. Perfect. Her antennae twitched and she turned to find Steve behind her.
His left antennae was bent and hung limp. Sickly splotches of purple marred his green skin. Everyone gave him a wide berth, covering their gills as they passed by. Would she be contaminated by association? She took a step back. “What happened to you? Are you contagious?”

Add Backstory In Phrases

Jami Gold has a great technique (and I’m sure she doesn’t use it exclusively) of adding backstory through phrases. Not paragraphs, not even whole sentences, but in phrases. Check out this excerpt from Jami Gold’s novel Stone-Cold Heart about the first time we meet the hero, a gargoyle named Garrett. (read Jami’s post on info dumps on page 1 here.)

Warmth crept through Garrett’s chest and spread into his limbs. Tingles followed, racing along his nerves, stirring sensations in his body.

For the first time in countless years, he awoke from stone-death. The human female curled between his limbs explained why. She must have focused enough trust toward him to help him regain full consciousness.

About blasted time. Although these circumstances weren’t the situation he wanted to encounter when he awoke. Of all the things he’d seen during his stone-death, he hadn’t seen the one thing he’d expected. None of his regiment had brought a human female he could use to awaken—or had even come by to check on him.

All those years in his vulnerable form, where his prison of stone could have shattered—ending his life. Years without word, without reports from the field, without conversations with his regiment. Years left alone. Abandoned.

Jami has bolded all the phrases that give backstory bits. Readers are drawn into this story world through the eyes of a gargoyle and what he’s concerned with RIGHT NOW. We know he’s just waking up after countless years asleep, that he needs a female to wake him up, he’s been forgotten, and that things aren’t right in his world. That’s all we really need at this point to cheer for Garrett.

An info dump would have seen Garrett reflecting on his past years as a gargoyle before he was turned into stone, perhaps the history of why he’d been abandoned by his gargoyle friends, blah blah blah. These would all be things he already knows but wouldn’t think about without a reason to bring up all that history. Instead, keep the reader rooted in the right now and what would organically come to the character’s mind.

Backstory should answer one question for the reader and leave them with two more.

Backstory And Deep Point Of View

If you’re writing your entire novel in deep point of view (as opposed to just using this technique for emphasis in key scenes), backstory and worldview info dumps whether through narrative, internal dialogue or spoken dialogue are easily avoided by asking yourself these questions:

What is the character worried about/interested in/working towards RIGHT NOW?
What information does the reader NEED to know RIGHT NOW in order for the story to make sense. How can I answer their most pressing question but leave them asking even more questions?
Which bits of backstory are so compelling that readers will be cheering for my character? (Look at Jami’s excerpt – Garrett’s been forgotten, a soldier left behind-vulnerable, and now someone’s woken him up. I’m already cheering for him.)
Why do I think the reader needs this information now? Is it just to prove I’ve thought of it? (You, as the writer, need to keep yourself out of the story.)

Remember, in deep point of view, the reader is restricted to only what the point of view character (POVC) knows, sees, hears, feels, touches, etc. But it’s also a very intimate and immediate style of writing, so just as we often reflect on the past, the memories are triggered by something in the here and now — a smell, a sound.

Answer The Why

With any bit of backstory or worldbuilding info you include, ask yourself why you’re putting that there, in that scene, right now. Is there an organic reason for the character to think of it? Otherwise it turns into what I call I-have-a-puppy syndrome. I’ve been a teacher in a variety of formal capacities, and it never fails that in a group of young children someone feels left out and interrupts the conversation by bouncing up and down, their hand shooting up in the air, to say, “I have a puppy!”

That’s what it feels like to the reader to be jerked out of the character’s head and sent on a bunny trail that neither feels organic to the moment or the character.

So, ask why you want to include that information in that place of the story. Ask why your readers need that information. Often, the reader needs only a fraction of what we think they need, but be sure and offer context for the character and the setting. Giving the reader too little information is as bad as too much.

Finally, ask whether the character really would be thinking or talking about that bit of backstory or worldbuilding. Because we rarely explain things to ourselves that we already know.

There’s Bob with Cindy, his third girlfriend this year.

There’s Bob. Is it Cindy? No, that was the second one. Mindy? I don’t remember.

Do you struggle to identify info dumps in your work? What’s your achilles heel – what kind of info dumps are you most prone to committing without realizing it?

Do You Really Have Writer’s Block?

October 19, 2018 by Lisa Hall-Wilson Leave a Comment

Is there such a thing as writer’s block? I don’t think it’s as common as writers would like to believe. I think we give the “writer’s block” label to a whole bunch of other things because we feel like we can’t do anything about writer’s block — so we’re off the hook.

Not so, my friends.

Do You Really Have Writer’s Block?

I think my experiences are fairly universal when it comes to the trouble of getting words down at a rate I find acceptable. But, I’ve also come to see that what I’ve classically labelled as “writer’s block” is in fact a host of other things I could do something about — if I put in enough effort or discipline.

Procrastination

There’s this myth that we should LOVE to write all the time. What job is like that? People get tired. They get distracted. There are sometimes other places we’d rather be, people we’d rather be with. Tasks we’d rather not do. If you have been given the impression that real writers love to write all the time and if you don’t you have writer’s block — that’s a lie. Sometimes it’s just plain old procrastination.

This could apply to a first draft, but for pantsers it most often applies to the seemingly endless revision process.

Poor Planning

This one goes hand in hand with procrastination. Sometimes, when we don’t know where the story is going next (talking to all my fellow pantsers out there), we feel stuck. We’re just not sure where to take the story next so we do nothing and call it writer’s block. In reality, if we’d take the time to sit down and do a bit of plotting (at least, this has been my way through it) or talking it out with a patient friend or partner, we can navigate our way out.

It isn’t that we don’t know what we could write or could take the story, we just want to minimize the rewriting we’ll have to do and so… We do nothing and call it writer’s block. It isn’t an inability to think creatively or write, it’s a reluctance to go the wrong direction.

Too Long In The Same Place

Get up and move around. Maybe that means moving to a new room to write or a new location. Maybe that means you pause every hour or so and do a bit of housework or go for a walk at lunch. Whatever works for you to reset your creativity and get those muscles working a bit.

When I feel stuck, I go for a walk or wash some dishes by hand. Often my best ideas come when I’m active and focused on something else that doesn’t require me to pay close attention. The shower is another place I am often able to think my way through a stuck place in a story.

Working Too Long

Did you know that most people only have 3-5 good creative hours in a day? If you’re one of those people who sit at a computer and expect to write non-stop (maybe pause for lunch) for 8 hours a day endlessly, I think you’re going to be frustrated. Make sure to incorporate other tasks into your day, either at the beginning (eat the frog) or at the end (reward).

Writers are observers. We take in life around us and then recreate what we see. If you do nothing but sit at a computer and stop actually observing and taking in life around you, how can you expect to write? Take a day off! Go for a hike. Try something small you’ve never tried before – take a cooking class, do a free gym trial, volunteer at an animal shelter. Do something small that scares you. You don’t have to jump out of a plane, but maybe that means talking to the new neighbour, trying a new class, or trying on clothes you’d never wear!

When Are You Most Creative?

Don’t feel that you have conform to whatever schedule those around you stick to. Work when you’re most creative. If that’s first thing in the morning or late at night, it’s easier to work with your internal clock than against it. Me – I have no creativity in the afternoon. None. I try to leave my marketing work for the afternoons – scheduling social media, creating social images, tinkering with the website, etc. I write in the mornings and late at night.

Now, sometimes we have life circumstances that prevent us from doing this (family, day job, etc.), so I’ve found the writing is harder when I’m working against my internal clock so I have to give myself a bit of grace for working slower than I’d like.

Fear Of (fill in the blank)

Sometimes we label our fears as writer’s block. What are you afraid of? That no one will read your work? That people won’t like your work? That you can’t get an agent? That you never seem to have all the pieces? Listen, every writer deals with those fears. Really. Every writer faces moments or seasons where they’re convinced they’re going to be exposed as the frauds they’re sure they are.

If you want to write, sit down and write. Does having someone’s approval make you a writer? Does having an agent make you a writer? WRITING MAKES YOU A WRITER! So write.

When Is Writer’s Block Actually Writer’s Block?

Opinions vary, right. Some deny that it exists at all (and I might be in that camp – see the Stephen King quote above). That said, I’ve found there have been times when all the things I’ve mentioned above don’t really apply. In my experience, writer’s block can often more properly be labelled as burn out. I wrote about that here. Burnout is debilitating and devastating, and the only way out of it is to rest and take a break.

Our mental health is an often over-looked drain on our creative resources. When you’re struggling with anxiety, worry, grief, depression, stress – being creative takes a backseat. You have a finite energy supply, so be kind to yourself when there is a constant drain on that supply for things outside of your control.

Be kind to yourself.

What about you? Do you think you’ve called a writing snag writer’s block when it was really one of the things (or something else) above?