A Bad Week for Writing

Good morning writers and a very happy Sunday to you all.

I was struggling to decide whether or not to blog this week, as I’d taken a couple of days away from the instagram due to having a pretty terrible week. For a few reasons, some small, some a little bigger, I have had a lot of stress and anxiety and find myself dreaming longingly of a forest retreat or a seaside holiday. Alas, work and life calls and no such break is on the horizon, but I am feeling a lot better today and today’s blog topic was the only one that made sense for this week.

A bad week for writing, indeed.

We all know that writing can be an escape from reality, but sometimes reality stops you from being able to write. I was simply far too agitated to focus. However, I am an optimist. At least I tell myself I am, and that in it’s self is optimistic right? Either way, I always believe that with every bad experience comes some good. So, here’s 3 ways to turn a bad week into some writing positives.

1. Use Your Emotions
I couldn’t focus on my story, my characters, my plot…but I could focus on my emotions. In fact, that’s all I could focus on. So I wrote them down, little notes about what I felt physically and mentally. A single word here, a small sentence there. Undoubtedly one of my poor characters is going to feel this way at some point and now I have a first hand account of what it’s like. Your emotions and reactions are real, giving them to your characters makes them real too.

2. Apply Your Situation
As I said, I was struggling to focus on actually writing, so I did this as a mental exercise and didn’t actually take any notes. I applied the situation I was in to various characters and considered how they would react if it had happened to them. It’s interesting because it really pulls apart the difference between characters and opens up some personality traits you may not have considered. It’s also a pleasant distraction from your own reaction, at least for a little while.

3. Read A Book
Writer’s often struggle to find time to write and it’s just as common for writer’s to struggle to find time to read. I couldn’t focus on forming my own coherent sentences, but I could focus on those written by someone else. So, I took myself away from writing and settled down with a good book and it really helped me to relax and lose myself for a while.

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While I hope you lovely lot don’t experience a week like this, I guess it’s sometimes inevitable. If/when it happens, I hope these tips can help you in some way.

Have you ever gone through something similar and tried something different? I’d love to hear your thoughts and advice, so please drop me a comment below. And don’t forget to let me know if you’ve tried the An Open Letter to My Protagonist exercise that I commented on last week.

Speak soon
and Keep Writing (if you can!)

M
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