How to Face the Blank Page

By Cynthia Light Brown

Some writers relish a blank page. They love to write crazy-fast first drafts. I hate those writers. Blank pages are p-a-i-n-f-u-l; give me revision any day.

I even hate blank pages when I’m well into a novel, because what I really hate is first drafts. I give myself permission to write a crappy first draft, but it doesn’t seem to help much; it’s still VERY slow.

So how to get through it? Some people write very detailed outlines of an entire novel before they ever start writing the actual draft. That never appealed to me. I think an outline has a place in my writing process, but more after the first draft, to help analyze the novel and see the weak points.

That said, I’m trying a variation on outlining that is helping. Before I write a chapter, I write a broad outline of what happens; it might be just 2 or 3 plot points. Then I take one of those plot points and further divide it into smaller actions. I’m not writing dialogue or descriptions yet (though if a snappy dialogue line pops into my head, I write it off to the side in a comment), just the action. It’s very much like blocking out a scene. Then I finally get to writing one of these finer plot points. And I’m flexible; sometimes I don’t have to break it down very much at all before I’m ready to write the first, crappy draft. Other times I have to break it down a lot.

This is just one way to Face the Blank. Others I can think of might be meditation, writing a stream of consciousness, or maybe using a voice recognition software like Dragon. Anyone else have luck with a particular method?

How Creativity Works...or doesn't

     I am currently in the midst of a big fat writer's block...I have some things I have been working and working on and not finishing, and some things I am waiting (and waiting!) to learn the fate of...and I am also  hoping for a light bulb to go off because I am in desperate need of a new good idea.  And while I am not-so-busy doing all of that, I am reading Jonah Lehrer's book IMAGINE   How Creativity Works.  It's been a wonderful distraction.  I now know that I must surround myself with walls painted blue, travel,  or move to a big busy city.  In addition I have also been assured that "...the feeling of frustration - the act of being stumped - is an essential part of the creative process..." Thank goodness!

Some of his information is familiar to me; like the benefits of surrounding yourself with a mixture of people and sharing ideas, interrupting your focus by taking a break when you are in a rut, or just letting go (when we  have become guilty of "constraining our own creativity.")  I have skimmed through much of the technical left brain/right brain, alpha wave rhythms and neuroscientific stuff, though I am now saddened as well as terrified to have learned of frontotemporal dementia.  What has intrigued me the most have been the anecdotal gems about the invention of the Swiffer by Procter and Gamble, how Nike came up with their "Just Do It' slogan, where the first Barbie Doll came from, and 3M's emphasis on innovation.  I was particularly surprised with Pixar's innovative office design, placing all of the employee restrooms in such a central location as to necessitate all employees interacting.  "The studio knows that an office in which everyone is interacting is the most effective at generating new ideas, as people chat at the bathroom sink...The secret of Pixar from the start has been its emphasis on teamwork, this belief that you can learn a lot from your coworkers...that's always when the best stuff happens: when someone tells you something you didn't already know..."

Feeling hopeless is one of the most common frustrations of many a creative journey.  Even Bob Dylan at one point told his manager he was done writing songs and had nothing else to say.  In 1965 he planned to move to Woodstock, leaving his guitar behind, to write a novel.  And it was out of his having felt at an end of one phase of his career; after he'd stopped searching, "...an answer arrived...."  Lehrer speaks of such tales of insight following an impasse, of eureka moments, how in that lonely Woodstock cabin Dylan found a way to fully express himself.  From hopelessness "he rewrote the possibilities of music."  "Like a Rolling Stone" was the result. 
So there's hope for all of us. Though in the meantime you can act like a 3M employee.  If they are struggling (with a difficult technical problem) they are actively encouraged to lie down on a couch by a sunny window, play a game of pinball, or daydream.  Sounds creative to me.

Kids Say the Darndest Things

Just like writing in general,  sometimes poetry comes easy and sometimes not so easy.  But when a great idea comes along, how quickly we forget all that writer's block!  In classrooms when I conduct poetry workshops, there are children that struggle and harrumph.  Some have an "Aha!" moment later on.  Some do not.  But there are also children that giggle to themselves and create something instantly and gleefully.  Recently in a local classroom while a fifth grade boy was coupletting, he came up with this gem:

My name is Mr. Dracula
My cape is red and blackula

And why his delightful couplet reminded me of Dickie Birkenbush, I guess, is maybe not so obvious... Dickie was the twelve year old young man who provided the ending to Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel to Virginia Hamilton while she was dining with his family on their farm.*  Hamilton had shared the fact with her dinner hosts that she had literally written Mike and Mary Anne into a corner. Dickie suggested that the steam shovel could become the building's heating source.  "My father had a garage in town that had a steam heating system, so I was familiar with it."  Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel is, to my knowledge, the only children's picture book with an actual credit (only in the book's original edition) to a pint-sized problem solver, carefully acknowledged on page 39.  Though Dickie Birkenbush was really Dick Berkenbush, the spelling was never corrected.   But no matter.  A little boy's creativity helped to save the day.  And you just never know where those little boys are going to turn up.

*www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2006/03/30/as_a_child_his_steam_fueled_hot_1939_childrens_classic/. Retrieved 2007-07-04.

Writer's Block vs Writer's Flood

As I watch the stream in my front yard spilling over, I think of one of the biggest challenges I faced when I started writing. This problem plagued me for years. Writer's Flood. I had so many ideas and flashes that it was difficult to stay on target. Characters ran away with tangents. Tangents turned into spillways. Plot holes deepened. My stories remained on the surface because I was so frantic treading water. We are talking waste water and I was up to my neck in it. I just had too many ideas and too many things distracted me.

I'd get into that creative whirlpool and while working on one story I'd wake up only to find a new story on my pillow. I hemorrhaged story. If you asked me "What is this story about?" I'd choke on all the ideas buzzing in my brain.

Learning to keep task on track has been a decade of struggle, but now I can do it. Picture my process as a stove top. On that stove top I have two burners in the front with two big soup pots bubbling away. Those are the two I'm allowed to work on. The next row back has three burners. These pots have lids on them. I'm allowed to take the lid off, throw in some spice, but that's it, then the lid goes shut and I have to finish one of the two up front. There's a third row back with four burners. I can only whisk off the lid, put in a little salt, and that lid gets slammed shut.

I told my agent (who sadly passed away) about this and she laughed and told me not to tell anyone about this. "Why?" I asked. "Because not too many people will understand this. You're high creative." I assured her I didn't smoke any of THAT and again she laughed. She repeated her caution and told me to be patient, that she was certain I'd get the tiger by the tail.

Getting my MFA has helped because it helped me deepen my ability to focus on character. Something else that helps even now is to find a favorite book and type into my computer the opening chapter. It's almost like doing warm-up exercises. It slows my popcorn brain and channels some of that excitement.

Someday perhaps I'll write about writer's block. Maybe.
But trust me, writer's flood can be just as much of a disaster. This morning when I woke up there was a girl sitting there and she told me her name was Harley Ryder. She lives in a trailer court. Her parents love motorcycles and she loves books. She's searched the trailer looking for adoption papers but hasn't found them. Yet.
She's on the fifth row back in a small stainless steel pot. The lid is on tight.