The Struggles of Writers Block & False Words

It had been ten minutes since she had sat down in her chair and vowed to write something that passed as a story, her eyes glued to her computer screen.

"What the heck do I even write about? What if my ideas are too similar to someone else's and I look like a plagiarizing criminal? How do you even make a story engaging?" she moaned to herself, fingers drumming impatiently on her desk. Writing used to come almost naturally to her, bursts of inspiration causing her to illustrate various situations with the power of words. She would love imagining settings and ideas in her mind, thinking about how to express these thoughts through writing. It had been easy to get lost in the whole process.

At least that's what the experience was like over summer break. It was easy to write when she was relaxed and not under pressure to fully complete a particular story.

But after school had started again in August, she was suddenly bombarded with tests, homework, projects, more tests. And essays. The essays in her AP World class were mind-numbingly dull and the cause of her lack of sleep some weekdays. She was interested in learning about history but having to write about it? In a timed manner? Not the most fun writing experience. English essays were a bit better, since she liked analyzing books, but the pressure of having it graded made the task stressful and unenjoyable. Yes, these essays improved her analysis and planning skills, but it did not motivate her at all to write more throughout the school year.

So here she was late at night, staring desperately at the screen in front of her, a 'writer' who hadn't written an original piece for months. In her desperation, she had searched up "book ideas", "fictional story ideas", and "romance story ideas" (her guilty pleasure) to glean some sort of inspiration. Still, her mind was completely and utterly blank.

'Maybe I can just write tomorrow and hope I have something', she begin to think but instantly shook that thought away. No, that was what she always told herself when she couldn't think of anything, a dangerous sentence that caused her to put off her goal of writing again, deceitful words that tricked her into believing it would be any different the next day. It was a cycle that had persisted during her school year, on weekends, and this summer. It was the reason why she hadn't written in so long, the reason why she couldn't even a finish short, simple story. Her mother, who always complimented her writing with enthusiasm, would sometimes ask "How's your writing going?" with a curious voice. Trying to ignore that her lack of written material was caused by her constant procrastination, the girl would only mumble out a "I haven't been doing it a lot but I will soon". If 'soon' meant doing it when she would finally muster up the willpower to, then she was technically being honest, right?

Despite her efforts to rid herself of her risky motto, her mind continued to be filled with emptiness and a desire to sleep in her soft, comforting bed. With a limp hand flattened against her cheek, the girl could only continue to stare at the blinking cursor, hoping that words would magically begin to fill the sad and blank space in front of her. Beginning to become drained of all motivation she had left, she decided to search up a phrase that she looked at time and time again, but never fully utilized: "writing ideas". It was a method that would inspire her temporarily, fueling her as she quickly opened up a writing program to flesh out an idea she found. But the minute the program would load, her drive would slowly fizzle out as she struggled to even think of a beginning sentence. Still, it might actually work this time... or at least she hoped it would.

Her eyes scanned quickly over the various results that had shown up, the words "creative" and "writing" being the most common ones across the screen. She decided to click on one of the first links, which was the one that seemed to boast the most prompts; a longer list might give her more ideas.

When the page had loaded, her tired eyes lazily looked at the showcased prompts, which were shown in a tiny font against a white background. The first ones she saw didn't particularly stand out to her, either seeming too complex for her exhausted brain to elaborate on or not seeming too appealing to write about. Some of them were genuinely interesting, like the one about a character waking up in a space craft alone, but she couldn't find the motivation to create original characters or a feasible plot.

She looked and looked for ten minutes, unsure of how to progress the prompts she found, going down the list of links that had appeared on her page. Her eyes were really getting tired now, the bright and glaring light of her computer screen causing her to squint as she read prompt after prompt. Her fingers seemed aimless as she scrolled down the long lists of offered ideas.

Ten minutes had turned to twenty when she clicked on the next link down the page, cheek sinking into her palm. Her willpower and determination had dwindled greatly, leaving her drained. When did writing become so hard? When did thinking of ideas become so difficult and tedious? What the heck had the school year done to her anyway?

She was already thinking of giving up and calling it a day when, suddenly, a prompt on the site she was looking at presented itself in big, bold letters.

It wasn't anything extraordinary or something that would inspire a story full of vibrant characters and vivid, fantasy-like worlds. But it perfectly captured her situation. It could be used to express her own emotions and her own thoughts. It was almost a miracle. She didn't need to try and think of a whole cast of people or imagine a complex setting. She already had everything she needed. Herself and her feelings.

"Writing about someone returning to something after a long hiatus," she pondered. "I wonder who that 'someone' could be".

Flexing her fingers and cracking her wrists, she prepared to finally write and end her long-time break.

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Thank you for reading!! :)

Not based on my own writing habits at all...