Your book is ready for you. The question is, Are you ready for your book?
If you aren’t ready to write, if you’re not feeling it, if you’re procrastinating, if you’d rather be doing other things, here’s how to dive into that novel draft (or any other writing):
Give yourself the time you need.
Feeling behind, feeling like there's not enough time, is a recording your brain made by listening to someone else. Your soul knows there’s plenty of time.
Unless you’re dying and you really want to finish the novel. In that case, just get to work.
Otherwise, give yourself some space. Don’t chain yourself to the desk. Let writing be a joy, rather than a task.
Let yourself feel your feels.
Whenever I experience writer’s block, it’s usually because there’s an emotion that’s clogging up the pipeline. Once I let myself feel it, the words start to flow.
Move your body.
Inspiration flows through the physical body, not just the mind. Do some stretches. Get on yoga YouTube. Go for a walk. Do any kind of physical activity that sounds good right now and see what appears.
Take a shower.
Showers always work for me. I step out clean and with either the next place to go in my writing or the understanding that now is not the time and I get to either rest or do something else. So helpful, that bathroom.
ASK FOR inspiration.
This blog post almost didn’t happen. I aim for both structure and inspiration in my business writing. (My current structure is an email to my list every Monday, a blog post right here every Wednesday, and a personal story on Patreon every Friday.) But I don’t like to force myself to write when I’m not feeling it. Writing is a joy to me and I don’t ever want it to become something else if I can possibly avoid it. Plus, forced writing rarely seems to do well or feel good to anyone.
However, no blog post was showing up for today. Hence, a pickle.
So I set the intention that the perfect blog post arrive in my brain with enough time for me to write it. I literally just thought, “I set the intention …”, and started doing something else with a big, fat “WE’LL SEE” rumbling through my uninspired brain.
Lo and behold, twenty minutes later, here I am. Typing up a post that arrived easily in my brain, and I have just enough time to press publish before I need to leave the house.
Thank you, requested inspiration, for un-pickleing me today!
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Want some help un-pickleing your writing?
I help writers bust through blocks and get their books onto the page!