7 Ways to Prevent Writer’s Block

7 Ways to Prevent Writer’s Block
Run!!

You can see it in the bushes. It has your scent. You run but it pounces. 
Well that’s not exactly how writer’s block works, but that is how it feels. Writer’s block can stop any writer in his or her tracks…..

EXCEPT YOU!!!!!

With these 7 tips, you can prevent it well before it rears its ugly head.

So let’s check them out:
1.Keep a Notebook

Ideas often strike like lightning. Something could spark creativity at any moment. Keep a notebook on your person that you can add your ideas to at any time.
2. Create a Routine

Human beings are creatures of habit. Find a way to habitualize your writing methods. If you can train yourself to write at certain times or in certain places, it gets easier. Cue, routine, reward. Create the cues, and the routines, and the reward is creativity.
3. Prompts

Think of prompts that you can store in your back pocket when you foresee a specific problem. The stranger the prompts the better. Keep them in the same notebook you keep your other ideas in. 
4. Constraints

If you find yourself not knowing what to write, lessen the time you have to write. Keep your same goals as far as pages, or words, but lessen your write time. Human beings work within constraints. There is something to be said for forced procrastination. 
5. Multiple Projects

Having multiple pots stewing in the kitchen is a great way to keep your creative juices flowing. When one project seems overdone and flavorless, jump to your other project with a renewed zeal. 
6. Mental Multi-tasking

We don’t spend all of our time writing. We go shopping, showering, and snow-shoveling, maybe. You can, however, spend your time thinking about your projects. This will become a slight obsession. Not a bad thing! It will help you produce ideas that will astound you.
7. Keep the Fun!

If writing stops being fun for you, you are doing it wrong. If you are stumped by writer’s block, start planning ways to spice things up. Go write in a Chuckee-Cheese. Go write upside down at a jungle gym. Do something that will make what you do different, because it is.

Conclusion

Let’s put a stop to the epidemic of writer’s block. We can stop it. Prevention is the answer. All we need to do is put these steps into practice. Let’s not forget that last one, to have fun. If we aren’t having fun, then let’s go be boring like normal 9-5 people.

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5 Tips to Overcome Writer’s Block

Here are a couple things to do in the moment to overcome writer’s block. They aren’t perfect solutions but they are steps in the right way. Here they are:

1. Step Away

Sometimes as writers we can get too close to our work. Sometimes we need to take a step back and look at things in a new light. Maybe we might pause the project for longer than a day. Give your brain time to think. 

2. Learn New Facts

The brain likes novelty. If you find yourself stuck, learn something new. Go onto wikipedia and click random article. Even just google “random fact” and see what comes up. This will help your mind start engaging about new ideas and how to incorporate them into your writing.

3. Work On the Outline

A building is built from a framework. Stories aren’t just put together. They require planning and forethought. Often when writing the minutiae, we overlook the big picture. Writer’s block might be a symptom of not enough macro planning.

4.Ask Questions

If stuck, re-read the last couple pages. Ask, and write down as many questions as possible. “Why does this character hate carrots?” “How would he react if…..” “What situation would embarrass the character the most?” Those questions were just examples. Once you have your questions, plan how you might answer them in the near future.

5. Idealogical Expulsion

The last resort is one of catharsis. Get out a blank piece of paper or doc, and “throw up” all of the ideas in your head, good or bad. Do not filter what comes out. Just write. Don’t worry about what makes sense or no. Just write. Once all the ideas are out, or you feel comfortable with them, re-read the ideas. Pick one. Write about it.

Conclusion

Writer’s block is the tax auditor of the writing world. It comes to each of us and stumps us for a while. It makes us go crazy for a while going back through what we’d already done. The best way to deal with writer’s block is to prevent it. Barring that, here are 5 quick tips to deal with it in the moment. Let’s all banish writer’s block forever.

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The Exchange Rate

As writers, we are in a very unique position. We are professionals, but not like other professionals. We work on commission, but on a different commission . 

     As a salesperson, you sell a product and exchange that product for money with the client. Essentially that is how every business works when it is reduced to its simplest form. We as writers can be reduced to an even simpler form.

     As writers we exchange books for money, but we can simplify what we do even more. What’s more, our exchange rate teaches us more about our priorities.

     As writers we exchange our words for their time and attention. You might be thinking, “hold on, that is a very idealistic sort of viewpoint.” On the contrary, this principle teaches us how we should view our work.

     As writers we need to realize that every single word is an exchange. They trust us and give their time and attention. They listen to us. That, and their time, sum up to be a very precious commodity. It is a finite resource, maybe the most finite resource. And they give it to us, for only our words.

     This means that our words must live up to the trust they give us. Every word we write must fulfill that promise that we make with the previous word.

     So let us all write with more consideration. Let us write with more solemnity. What we write is what we exchange for another person’s time. That way books become timeless.

Character Profile: Egren Tomus 1.1

“I was born through death. It seems a significant thing to note. Many men died, and then I was. I cannot explain fully what brought me into life. Perhaps I always was. Perhaps it was just a new chapter opening up before me.

Regardless of my origins, I opened my eyes and saw azure blue sky. I saw puffy white clouds drifting lazily across the heavens. I saw pillars of black smoke rise angrily into the serene sky. Slowly, I started to register a great commotion. I raised my head and propped myself up with my hands. I looked around and saw and felt great confusion. All around me, men were dying. Some wore  armor, others heavy leather clothing. No matter where I looked I saw the work of Death. I hesitate to mention, but in light of my calling and my duty, I must, that I felt neither sorrow nor empathy. I felt nothing, but a cold observance. This startled me more than the grisly scene assaulting my senses, involving all five in an extremely thorough way. I knew I should have felt something, though I did not know why, or what I should have felt.

I felt my fingers squelch as I turned my body this way and that to better observe. I brought them up to see why they were wet and moist. They were crimson red, stained with blood.  I stared at them for a while, unsure of what to do. I looked down at the rest of my body. I was naked, but my flesh was not human. Though I felt human, I have come to find out that I am something else. As I looked at myself, I realized, that my skin was completely transparent. My bones, muscles, and other entrails were all visible to the naked eye. More strange than that, there were what looked like clear crystalline structures jutting out of body at different point on my body. It seemed that one sprouted from each major muscle group and rose from my body about two inches. They appeared sharp, but they cause me no pain. How odd.

I next experienced a great weariness and a longing, one so deep and unknown that I almost lost my strength. I then felt a flash of energy and my strength returned. Interested in finding the cause of this burst of energy, I looked at my surroundings. I finally noticed the blood that tarnished my hands. It had come from a pool left by a dead man a yard from where I had lain my head. I had set my hands in the pool accidentally in order to prop myself up. I looked at my hands. The blood on my hands no longer shone with a crimson red sheen, instead it was black like smoky and it seemed to pull light into it rather than reflect any. There was no shine even though I new it was still a liquid. What had happened? I did not know, and I did not know how I could find out.

Out of fear, I fled. I fled the battlefield and ran into a nearby forest. I picked up a cloak as I ran. I didn’t know what I was, but I knew enough to hide myself, though from what I couldn’t say.”

-Excerpt from the Archives of Egren Tomus, the Memorious.

Creature Profile: Mirror Wisps

“In all my travels, I have come across many different creatures. In the sands of the wind blasted plains of the Riddens, I found one creature most interesting.  Other men undoubtedly would have found it disturbing and frightening, however as I am untouched by the Fear, I found it only thought provoking.

We encountered the creature along the descent of sand dune that was surprisingly solid, not shifting like the others we had traversed, and it was much larger than others we had scaled. As we continued down we found the entrance to a cave. The cave was filled with glass, well it was glass. The walls, the floor and the cieling. There seemed to be a light in the cave so we entered being very curious. We saw what looked like the reflection of treasure and that was the nature of our expedition; to find treasure. We entered and soon we found ourselves separated. I don’t know really how it happened, we were there and then we weren’t.

In retrospect it was easy for us to get lost. The glass had such properties as to reflect almost perfectly one’s surroundings. We couldn’t tell when the cave split into two tunnels that led down, each in different directions. The glass also had the properties of moving slightly. They say that glass is a liquid. The glass definitely seemed liquid, as if it moved and breathed and was alive. It wasn’t of course. We followed the trail downward our curiosity pulling us down. Then we started hearing the screams.

We did not encounter the actual Mirror Whisps for another ten minutes. We were walking until the last man in our group froze and yelled and we turned back to see his arm bleeding, cracked as if like glass, and missing a chunk. Another man was similarly struck even while we watched, but we couldn’t actually see what had hurt him. It took us some time to actually think about looking in the glass.

The glass because it reflected what was around it showed all that was, and some that wasn’t. I was actually the one to see the large black shape. It looked like a spindly figure with very slim arms and legs and spines coming out its back. Instead of a head it has a swirling ball of silvery black smoke and two eyes that always seemed be looking at you.  I saw it in the glass. It was standing in the shadow of the first man whom it had bitten. It began to really dig into the man, producing even more screams.

Naturally we all ran. No matter how fast we ran though, the creature seemed to keep pace without tiring. It always seemed to stay standing in the shadows of the people it chased even if only visible in the glass. We rounded a bend and ran into the other group. Some of the glass upon which we had run cracked as we all bashed into each other. The creature seemed to stop behind the cracked glass, unable to move forward. I told eveyone to crack the glass and then run. We crack the glass in a circle around the tunnel entrance and finally we made our way outside.

We did not go back into the cave to find the bodies of our comrades. We later learned from local tribesmen that that was a cave of unholy spirits. Well, we took their advice and moved on. Though fear does not affect me, I do not wish to return there ever again. ”

-Tolari the Remained.

Historical Note: The Centerpoint

There was one instance in history. The God’s finally abandoned the world. At least that was how it seemed. In reality, they were forced to leave. The forces that actually run the universe demanded their removal. Eternium ceased to function. It seemed all the spiritual energy of the planet had been siphoned off. That was why the moon exploded.

 

That instance soon became known as the Centerpoint. The name had no particular meaning other than that given by the prophets who rose up soon after claiming that the Gods had abandoned them and that there were new Gods, Universal Gods, Gods that had always been there but that had hidden in the shadows. No one believed them until they noticed how things had changed, until they noticed how the Magiques and the Wise Men could not access Eternium. To all trained eyes, it seemed that Eternium was gone. It wasn’t. It just changed. The Universal Forces deemed it a useful tool. They twisted it to their own natures. In essence all the pieces of the game were still there, their rules had just changed.

 

The physical deformation of the world was no less shocking. The entire world turned on its side. Cities fell into the earth, and the sea, while others rose into the sky. Entire mountain ranges burned while falling into the sea. Half continents fell underwater. As mentioned before, the moon even exploded. This happened due to another celestial body colliding with it. They shattered and created  two new moons. The moons can create gravitational anomalies. History itself changed.
The greatest effect of the Centerpoint was the shift in progress. Thus far, all technological advances past basic mechanics such as carriages and crossbows was Eternium based. With the apparent disappearance of Eternium, studies progressed elsewhere. Modern mechanics and science began to flourish. Technology soon forgot Eternium for the sake of Science. Science however never revealed the darker sister of Eternium, Etemos. The Forces of the Universe would never leave themselves without power.

Creature Profile: Whisper Wraith

There are things in the realms that still have yet to be explained.

In the city of Kasfaal, there is the conclave of Whisper Wraiths. It is a guild of assassins, and murderers of the most disturbing level. A Whisper Wraith is inhuman.

They began soon after the World Forgers left their powers. There was a conflict, a great war. Naturally all the World Forgers who thrive on chaos were drawn like vultures to the carnage. There were two kings, King Pol and King Terroff. King Pol sought to dominate and subjugate King Terroff. In order to avoid the conclict, King Terroff hired an assassin to murder King Pol. King Terroff did not know that he had contracted with Sileo, the World Forger whose Dominance was murder, and homicide. Under the guise of a simple assassination, Sileo agreed to do the killing.

Silently, Sileo entered the private quarters of King Pol. He slipped his crooked knife between King Pol’s ribs and dipped its tip into his heart. He pulled it out as the King’s sleeping eyes popped open and then glazed over. Sileo, pulled upon the field of eterneum surrounding them and prolonged the King’s life long enough to offer him a deal.

“You are dying.” Sileo stated in a voice that is crisp like ice, but not threatening.

“Help me…I can… Pay….” The King gurgled through a throat that was filling with blood.

“Good. You shall pay. I offer you a deal now. You will live. You will serve me. I will give your continued mortality. You will be granted limited immortality. Do you agree?” Sileo whispered looking straight into the King’s terrified eyes. Silently, the old King nodded. Sileo smiled.

“You are now Whisper Wraith.”

 

A Whisper Wraith is an assassin. He survives on Silean Eternium, Eternium generated through assassination, and murder. Each Whisper Wraith is created when Sileo himself makes a deal with a dying man. The man contracts to serve Sileo, while Sileo grants continued life, a hated and murderous life. Whisper Wraiths are shrouded in the clothes they would have been buried in. The only visible part of their face is their eyes, which gleam an ice blue. They have no trouble seeing in the dark, and some have also been able to see in terms of certain Eternium.

Inside the folds of their wrapped and cloaked body are chains. Each chains represents the last words of someone they have murdered. They survive on the last words of dying men through Silean Eternium. They must exist in secrecy otherwise they are consumed. Whisper Wraiths are unkillable except for stealing all of their dying words, or you learn their real name.

The Whisper Wraiths have claimed the city of Kasfaal as the home of their guild of assassins. They live in the under city and thrive on intrigue and contracts to kill. They are bound together as servants and accept payment from their employers so they can purchase newer weapons and increase their network of spies and contacts. They send agents all across the land.

Underneath their cloaks they are an ice blue smoke and a dark skeleton. In each of the chains are little ice blue beads, the dying words of men. They give the wraith’s power.