I agree with Nilfiry. Unless you are rushing to meet a deadline, take a break. Whenever I hit a rough patch and don't feel inspired, I shift gears and write on another subject that flows easier. I have been working on two books right now and have been able to constantly write on one or the other. I would not suggest doing this with more than two at one time so that you don't leave your work unfinished.
Never experienced writers block. I do experience a reluctancy to open my word documents though. I don't know why, but sometimes I find myself being terrified of writing. I suppose I'm afraid that I've wasted my time and my writing sucks ass. But once I do tell that side of my brain to fuck off and get stuck into where I left off, I find myself fully enjoying it.
I get editor's block. The proof copy arrives and it takes me three days just to open the thing. I do not want to get started. Once I do, it flows just fine, but it's like there is this big, imaginary pressure. But the pressure is all coming from me! Stupid brain! Whose side are you ON?!?! My only cure for writer's block is to sit and write. Slowly, grinding out word after word, making glacial progress toward my daily goal. But if I don't sit there, the block won't go away. Once it finally does though.... I'll try to write a scene that is exciting, gripping, riveting, all those stupid blurb words other people put on book jackets to show that they never actually read it. When Steven King writes a blurb, it is immediately obvious that he actually sat down and read the dang thing! Love that. But write something fun! Even if you have to skip ahead in your narrative. Skip away! This is your world and it is only as amazing as you make it. LITERALLY! You are creating your entire reality, when you write (fiction) so for crying out loud, make yourself happy and swing for the fence
I do understand writer's block. I think I mentioned somewhere that it seems there's always the "Suck it up!!" types who can write while a tornado is ripping the walls of their home from around them and maintain the opinion that all writers should be just like that. Wrong. Every creative artist has ideal working conditions and if those are compromised their writing ability will be too directly proportional to the degree of compromise. Boom cars and basketball thumping outside my writing work area can be so distracting that it is senseless to even try thinking of that perfect word or phrase that makes the keyboard come to life. Writing is enough of a war with words to begin with. I don't need Chinese water torture thumping in the background. For me this has compromised my writing schedule down to nothing. In fact that is the reason I started looking to writing forums again. It helps, but where getting back on schedule is concerned, the cigar is still lost till I can get a new writing work area together, probably with good soundproofing and likely the first real work to go out the door will be to file a nuisance action against the perps. For me, to write I need solace. Whatever it is for you to be in your perfect writing frame of mind, that is what you need to recreate. There effectively can't be a "just when you thought it was safe" moment.
I've never had writer's block, thanks to a tip I read decades ago. When time to stop, and know precisely how the scene will progress, what the characters will say and what will happen--I stop. Mid paragraph, mid sentence, ever mid word. When I return to where I stopped, the memory clicks in and I type as if I never left. I never stop at the end of a chapter or major scene. I think that creates the writer's block when trying to start again.
I am a french canadian and I used to write a lot, (in french obviously). I loved it. Then I moved to another province (an english speaking province) and I can now do pretty much anything in english. I am now bilingual but i lost my ability to write; When I write in french again it just isnt the same, I have lost the 'magic touch', due to the fact I havent been around the french language. And I can't write in english either since its not my first language and I am not quite comfortable enough. This makes me sad. Really. Writing was all I had.
I lost my ability to spell Columbus when I learned Spanish. But now there is spellchecker. I'm not trying to be flip. I can speak Spanish after I'm immersed in it for a week. Without that the rust forms, but it doesn't take much to scrape that rust off. I say, write in French. It will come back to you, it's not gone.
I'll add to that and say write in both. What you had will come back, and you can certainly pick up some new tricks in English. Don't hold yourself back with "I can't" even if the evidence is there. "I can't" is only a part of the phrase anyway. It should be "I can't yet." Perk up and give it a shot, we don't like pity threads. Take that to The Not Happy Thread.
Who's 'we'? Do you have authority to speak for the rest of the people here? And maybe empathy is a better word to use in this case. Too little of that in the world today. To the OP: Take a break. Try something else for a while. The muse will return. And ignore the hard noses. They'll always try to push your cart if you let them.
This is probably more the problem rather than not being in a francophone environment. Its impossible (for me anyway) to write if I am depressed and down. Why is writing all you have? If you left friends and family behind in the french place it sounds like you badly need to put down some roots now.
Marchombre, I took French in high school, having French-Canadian descent. I did reasonably well, still at 17 I joined the Army to avoid Nam. Ironically, I was shipped to Germany to be trained for duty in Nam. I learned to speak German and French waned. Now German is my weak second language and French is a weaker third. I have a novel that uses smatterings of French, so I could use some help with that. Perhaps you could expand your own horizons by working on the sidelines with writer like me.
Thank you all for your support! Pity? No , I'm not looking for any pity, Hahaha, more like some advice and some encouragements maybe. Perhaps I made it sound more depressing then it really is, I was in a weird mood last night... Well the fact is that I DO have try writing, I have attempt it countless of times but it all end up with the same feeling, frustration. It takes me three time as much effort to just get close to where i used to be and I am not even there yet. The words just don't come out as easily. I feel like an athlete who broke one of his body part and who now have to relearn how to do everything.
Do you still read books in French at least? If not, I would suggest picking something up and starting there. Perhaps L'Etranger by Albert Camus?
there's lots more to enjoy in life than just writing... find something else you like to do, till the writing bug bites you again... or to keep you busy/happy, if it doesn't...
I'm wondering if in learning your new language, you may have lost some of the nuances of your native French. I think that there is much in the subtleties of language that fuels what we love in literature. So, I would second @thirdwind's suggestion that you delve back into whatever you love most in French writing and reconnect. I'm guessing that it won't take long to re-ignite your fires. Good luck.
Personally, I think the language change is an excuse. Something else is going on. There is nothing stopping you from writing a little a day, at least.
Writing is a wave, you've gotta ride the crest of it when it's there and wait until it comes around again. So avoid writers block, rather than standing directly in it's path. I kinda compare it to stepping back from something, let it's force be expended then move in to engage when the time is right.
Personally, I don't even understand how this is a sticky. - Mainly because I consider "Writer's Block" a delusion. In my humble opinion, the root of the problem isn't even revolving around being unable to write, but the fact that a time of annoyance or feeling lesser creative makes you believe that it's got something to do with something that can be defined, as a "condition." Because: "It's a condition, right? So it's natural, right? So I can blame it as a condition, right?" Wrong. As soon as you define your lack of creativity as a "condition," you fool yourself into thinking that it's justifiable, that it'll pass and that you'll just... "Have to give it time." While, sure, that might work in the long run, because by giving it time you'll eventually, inevitably, discover new sources of inspiration and gather new strength of will to continue working on your texts, but due to having labelled the problem as a defined "condition" you'll likely end up spending more time reconciliating than you'd have to, and than you would if you hadn't deluded yourself. Bottom line point is, you're stronger than you think you are, you're more creative than you think you are, and you are especially more capable than you think you are. These facts are repressed by admitting to the existence of something as, and excuse me for naming it as such, silly as "Writer's Block." If you know that you enjoy writing, then there is no other way around the problem than to force yourself back to that feeling of joy, writing is like a job you like, it's not going to be enjoyable ALL THE TIME. - You're going to be tired, you're going to be fed up with it, you're going to hate it. But you also love it. Oh, and, my apologies if I am stating anything exactly like someone previously to me in this thread, I have admittedly not read the entire thread. And I apologize if anyone finds anything I say here offensive, do keep in mind, though, as I've clearly stated: These are my opinions, not factual claims.
I can only say that in winter the bball across the street has finally stopped, so I can get back to some peace and quiet. Unfortunately, that is accompanied by a host of other winter worries...
Music helps me to drown out annoying sounds or people. Either that or I leave to a place that is not distracting. Telling people to stop playing bball so that you can write in quiet sounds a little.....
... like the mean old man on the block. Yup! C'est moi! The meanest man in the neighborhood... Actually I don't think it's so mean to ask for a compromise, i.e. asking the neighbors to move the hoop around the corner, that even being a safer place. These are the type of people who, should you ask them to stop doing something annoying, they will ramp it up ten fold. Indiana has nuisance laws. These activities fall into the category of private nuisance. The police won't uphold the laws, instead they coddle the local social mores. Anarchism ascends. If LEO's won't do the job we pay them to, why should we pay them? I have a few more months to bring a law suit against them and get an injunction. All that could have been avoided had the jock mindset listened to the Doc on the block. Now the Doc has to teach them a lesson.
Addendum: I imagine it was my fault for being the "meanest man in the neighborhood" that the bball players returned on dirt bikes (all black kids, too), to poison one of my dogs. Very well mannered malamute. That same dog had a spelling vocabulary of about ten words; two in Latin. I wonder if the bball bouncers have that...
I find that writers block is simply when you're trying to force your mind to go one way when a detour is needed. I think it's a defense mechanism, actually. I want to write non-stop 24/7, but your mind sometimes gets worn out. I went an entire summer with writers block once. It was awful. Recently, I realized that as I felt writers block coming on, I simply needed to write about something else--something not related to my stories. Doing so helped me get my confidence back and let me take a short break from what I was doing. After I was done, I was able to get right back to writing. So, my advice? Take a break from what you're doing. If you want to keep writing, write in your journal. Write about what happened to you that day. Write about your hopes and dreams. The creative juices will still be flowing, and you won't feel despair.
