Meditating on the Block—Jillian Grant Shoichet

At some point in the past, I must have said in a DeadLies meeting that I garden when I’m struggling with writer’s block. I tried that yesterday. It didn’t work. All I could think of was gardening—which plants needed water, what the deer had eaten, where the gates for the new fence were going to go, how things would look next spring. Yes, it was a relief to not think about writing – or, rather, to not think about not writing—but I can’t say it helped my writer’s block.

By the end of a couple of hours, I was sore and tired. I wasn’t inspired to sit down and write. I wasn’t inspired to do anything other than pour a glass of wine and watch “The Office”.

But this morning I took the dog for a walk. I am fortunate to have a dog that doesn’t require much attention when we walk, which leaves me free to meditate—on whatever I see around me, or on the sound of my breath, or on the smell of fall. Today, there was something about having an hour to not do anything else but think about writing­ that made me realize I’ve been dealing with writer’s block in the wrong way.

In the past, I’ve tried to distract myself from writing. I garden, I clean the house, I read, I cook, I exercise. But this morning I was conscious of focusing on writing. I ran potential characters and possible first lines through my head. I thought about the elements I especially liked in the last story I wrote. I thought about what I didn’t like. I brainstormed unlikely situations and how different characters might react to them. I came up with new places to find bodies and looked at old places to find bodies in new ways.

By the end of the walk, I had a new killer, a new victim, and a new first line. I don’t recall what my dog was doing during the walk, and I don’t really remember where we went or whom we saw or how long we were gone. But I don’t really care because I know what I’m going to write today. And I know what I’m going to do next time I have writer’s block.