Just start typing. “I don’t have anything to say today. I wish I did but I don’t, I don’t understand why but the words just aren’t coming. Mabye I’m tired. Maybe I’m burnt out. Maybe I’m still thinking about the things where what my husband said made me feel some kind of way.”
Do you see what’s happening here? I’m problem-solving as I go. I’m sorting out solutions or answers or suggestions for what might be the root cause of the situation of not having anything to say.
Or you could get more specific–“Why am I having so much trouble writing from Merrilyn’s point of view. Is it that I don’t know her very well yet? Is it that I’m unclear on what needs to happen in this section to get from point A to B to C, etc.? is it because she’s never had a voice before, and she needs to assert herself–and that’s something you’ve always had trouble doing in your own life? Do you feel like she can’t assert herself because you have always had the same problem?”
Now I’m getting somewhere. Maybe if I just sit down and just write out what all happens to her in a rush, covering incidents from the next eight years of her life. Then I can fill in the details on another rewrite.
Just start typing and see what you have to say.
Julie Liddell Whitehead 