Writers Block

10 May 2011
I am approaching this blogging space with fear and trepidation.  First off, I am not that public with my writing, particularly writing that hasn't been read and scrutinized by my personal readers and my writing groups. There seems to me to be something about blogs that scream for attention for the writer and I am more of a closeted writer.  However, I am going to use this space to write (talk) about writing insecurities, anxieties, and other issues that seem to make the words stop flowing.  As I put these words on this computer screen I recall all the students who talked about their own writers block--how they didn't turn in an assignment because they couldn't think of anything to write about or they couldn't get the words to come out on the paper in a way that they weren't embarrassed to hand in.  Because our school system is one of grades for work done and handed in, I have often demanded that they write something, revise, rewrite, revise, rewrite until they had at least something to hand in. How tormented they must have felt as they tried and tried to get something to show up on the computer screen or in the notebook, fretted over writing something interesting--worthwhile.  Now all their humiliation comes thudding down on my head.

Filling a space with writing is not that difficult.  I do it every day when I compose my 600 words early in the morning in the privacy of my study on my private computer screen and save them to a private folder.  I do it again at the beginning of every class period when I write with my students for 15 minutes. I can fill pages in daybooks and MS Word documents.  But I hesitate to publish--send it out into the world. I wonder if I have said anything that anyone else wants to read--that fear of looking stupid.  And I wonder how many students write and write, but hesitate to publish--hand in the paper.  I have that same trepidation about hitting publish post.

So.  What does filling a space mean?  How will I fill this space?  And who will care?  I want to use this space to explore the fears and trepidations of writing for the public (whatever and whoever that public may be). Through this exploration I hope to shed some light on writers block--what causes it--and, by getting at the cause, seeking remedies.