WRITER'S BLOCK AND GOOD INTENTIONS
The only thing about attending this University, is that no one will notice if you don’t show up. Not just University but well, for all creatives. No one will notice if you don’t finish writing that story or drawing that picture. There is no teacher or looming deadline to force our imagination to be activated or to be prioritized. No one will notice if you don’t show up but everyone will notice when you actually do. It’s just that there won’t ever be emails from a college server telling you to finish your homework or get the paperwork in. Submit that story or take that chance. It is something we have to each individually do, our ideas won’t create themselves.
I started working on children’s illustrations for the first time in a couple months last week, and boy have I missed it. I have missed writing pictures and drawing words, the late midnights, the adrenaline of seeing a simple idea fully come to life before your eyes. I love every piece of it all. Drawing the pencil outlines, sketching storyboards, the first layer of water color is pure magic. Let alone after layers of water color, finally getting to add the outline in colored pencil, it literally gives me butterflies every time. I keep all my illustration supplies in different boxes, most of them are old cigar boxes. Not only do they have character but they smell amazing still! Tonight I finally got around to the brush marker segment on my illustrations, I opened the box for the first time in months and was greeted by the familiar, comfortable scent. It felt like greeting an old friend more than anything else, an old friend that I have missed dearly. And that’s when I realized two incredibly, dangerous things for all creatives- writer’s block and good intentions. The two things that have been hindering my creativity when it comes to my second children’s book, The Wooden Ballerina.
Even now, I doubt writer’s block exists. I don’t think it’s a mystic force that hits us out of nowhere, rather I believe it’s a roadblock that we tend to build ourselves. Either it’s a wall we build with doubts and insecurities, lack of inspiration, or it’s that moment when you are standing in a forest with countless trails before you and you can only choose one. What about this idea? Or that one? What if I take the story this direction and it’s a dead end? Or the wrong one! You start writing a sentence and immediately erase it, sketching your character and immediately stopping. The thing is, no one ever said it was easy. No one ever said it didn’t take a pioneer to create something wonderful- because it does. You have to be willing to take the rabbit trails, discover something new. Or even turn back around, write the second page. If it’s not ‘it’ then turn back around and try another trail.
The worst that can happen is you have a beginning.
If our doubts and insecurities knew that, they probably wouldn’t hang around much either. If they knew that not getting it perfect on the first try isn’t really a big deal or that failure isn’t a bad thing they probably wouldn’t even show up. Failure is actually the best thing that can happen to a creative, it pushes us out of our comfort zones and stretches our imaginations to find another way. If our doubts and insecurities knew that, I don’t think they would show up and create a block the way they do. You may have to tell them that yourself, and that means you may have to actually believe it yourself. Creativity is a process, it takes time and it takes commitment. If you’re in it, you’re in it for the long haul. So give yourself a break, the perfect plot will rarely fall out of the sky. The unique, one of a kind illustration will rarely come with the first line. Seuss was rejected 28 times before his first book was finally published. I doubt the ‘To think I saw it on Mulberry Street’ that we know today was the exact same one he showed to that first publisher. Something tells me it took 27 rejections, critiques to prepare his manuscript for that 28th chance. Not just that, but persistence to keep going. To give ourselves and our stories a fighting chance- which means giving them more than one chance to be perfect.
Writer’s block is definitely guilty for the past couple months, but also good intentions. It is easy to get caught up doing good, worthwhile things without ever doing purposeful things. Like working that day job, cleaning, sketching a flower for the thousandth time. None of these things are bad, but they won’t add or support your creative career. As creatives we have to be extremely intentional with our time, if we aren’t it will never just happen. There will always be something to do, a text to answer, or somewhere else to be- and there will always be that story. That idea, that spark of imagination. It will always be there, but it will only ever just be there unless you are intentional to spend time developing it. No one will know if you never do, no one will ever know the story you had to tell- not even you. That is a regret and wonder that I personally don’t ever want. Be intentional with your time. Set aside time. 30 minutes or 3 hours, it adds up and makes a difference. Be intentional to do things that matter and not just things that are good, despite the best intentions those sort of things will never create the story or paint the Mona Lisa.
Show up, It may be hard- like pioneering through thickets but it will blaze a trail. Follow it and get lost. As creatives let’s be intentional to do a lot more of what matters and a lot less of what doesn’t.