Wouldn't you know it – two weeks
after starting a blog, I get smacked in the face with final exams, summer job
hunting, and most dreadful of all – writing
funk.
Used in the same connotation
as your favorite infectious disease, I use ‘writing funk’ to refer to the
inability to write anything good. It’s
not quite the same as writer’s block, and requires different battle tactics,
but the end result is pretty much the same – very little writing and a very
frustrated writer.
Not being the sharpest tack
in the drawer, I almost always go at writer’s funk swinging. This would work fantastically if the problem was the
poor writing – but the problem goes deeper than that.
When I’m in the middle of a
project, I’m surrounded by the story, the characters, all the subplots and
foreshadowing and atmosphere and word choice. In the short-term, that’s great –
in the long-term, I risk loosing sight of what I’m aiming for in the first
place. I get frazzled, I start nit-picking (er, more than usual) – and
ultimately I turn to distraction.
Fortunately for me, one of
those distractions was a book. I know, I know – people say not to read while
writing, because you’ll steal the other author’s voice or ideas or at the very
least get sucked away from your own project. But you know what? Sometimes it’s
hard to see beyond the guts of a story and see the whole beast. Sometimes, a
good book is a breath of fresh air, and a better reminder than media like movies,
music, or comics how powerful words alone can be.
My prescription of one good
fantasy novel is working well so far. I hope to be back into noveling – and much
more active in blogging – now that the funk’s being warded away. I’m excited
about my stories once again, and it’s back into the thick of writing for me!
