Ten ways to deal with writing stress

Writing and stress don’t mix very well. Not for me, anyway.

Sure, small amounts of stress (like having to meet a deadline or get a higher grade) can motivate you to produce—but if my stress gets out of control (which it tends to do more often than I’d like) then it can be one of the most destructive things to my creative process.

It infests my mind, entrenching itself in the background of everything I do, potentially corrupting every word I write. It prevents me from organizing my thoughts, releasing chemicals that amp up anxiety, and in my case, causing severe and extremely distracting headaches—making writing even more difficult than usual.

That’s why it’s so important to keep control of your stress: letting it control you will kill your drive to write even quicker than having no direction.

Luckily though there are ways to fight back against stress and relax.

Ramblings: why learning to write is painful

The way that we learned to walk was an exhausting and painful process. The way that we learn to tell stories is even more exhausting and much more painful.

Why? I guess it has something to do with our expectations.

It’s like we expect ourselves to be experts at all of this on day one.

We have these great stories in our heads and we expect ourselves to be able to just write them out. We expect ourselves to be able to write one awesome draft and be done with it. Maybe we’re not naïve enough to expect writing to be easy, but we definitely expect ourselves to be better at it. Don’t we?

But we’re not.

How I ensure a successful morning, every morning

The morning hours, just after I wake up, are the most important hours of my entire day.

Why? Because these are the hours that control what type of day I’m going to have.

Is it going to be a lazy day? Or is it going to be productive?

Am I going to get a little extra work done? Or do the bare minimum?

Is it a relaxing day? Or is it stressful?

Is it good or bad?

open or full?

Successful, or not?

All of this depends on what type of morning I have—and that’s why it’s so important for me to spend these hours wisely…

Because the success of my day at large is entirely dependent on the success of my morning.

But how do I ensure that every morning a success?

Writing the rat race away

Life is crazy. We all know that.

Because life these days isn’t actually life: it’s just one big rat race.

Everyone is running from point A to point B as fast as they can; doing everything they can to stay focused on the prize; pushing themselves to run harder—faster. Never satisfied with where they’re at. Always wanting to be more, better, greater.

The end goal is what’s important—and anything that get’s in the way of achieving that goal is to be avoided.

What a horrible way to live. What a soul sucking way to work. Who in their right mind would want to run in a race like that?

It sounds horrible and exhausting and… And it sounds… Oh…

… it sounds like the exact same way so many of us think about writing.

Great.

Discovery writing shouldn’t happen by accident—here, take these three ways to do it on purpose

As writers and storytellers, we’re always searching for… something.

We’re always trying to figure out new techniques to use in our writing and make it better. Or we’re looking for new and exciting ideas to use in our stories. Or we’re hunting for inspiration. Or trying to find beauty to put in a poem.

Or, simply, waiting for a peaceful moment to sit, and think, and dream, and discover something new…

The anticipation of discovering something amazing about a new story was about as addicting to me as the feeling you get in your stomach when you’re riding a roller coaster—that sort of nervous excitement that stews inside of you just before the first drop.

Sure, I loved it. Writing would be a lot less fun for me without that feeling. Yet, despite that, I couldn’t help but feel like something was wrong with the whole situation…

It came down to this: was I really okay with the best parts of my stories coming about completely by accident?

No. No I was not.

One of the most useful tools for self motivation that you should have in your toolbox.

There we were—a basketball team with a roster eight men deep shallow, and hardly a true basketball player among us—trying to compete against schools much MUCH larger than us; all of which were able to field teams with rosters filled to the brim by hardcore, true blooded, diehard basketball players.

The whole situation felt suspiciously like the setup to your typical disney-channel-esque basketball movie.

You know, the type of underdog story where the little guy rises up against all odds to take home the big trophy. By the end of the season, though, it didn’t turn out that way; we didn’t come in first; we didn’t take home the trophy…

But we did come in second.

Most people would have never thought that a basketball team made up of non-basketball players, from a school so small that nobody had ever heard of it, would have been able to take second place in our league.

But that’s because most people didn’t know about our secret weapon.

What secret weapon, you ask? What could possibly take a team like mine and turn us into a basketball team from an almost-disney-channel-esque basketball movie?

We were really good at pretending.

Are you even good enough to be a writer?

I spend a decent amount of time on online writing forums.

It’s a great feeling to be able to interact with and help out other writers directly. I love being able to read what they’re working on, and give the occasional piece of advice or input. For someone like me, these communities of writers are like some sort of heaven…

But the best part about frequenting these forums? The other users are always asking questions…

Lately though, I’ve noticed a very annoying question popping up more and more often.

Am I good enough to be a writer?

Seriously? Are you good enough? You have to be joking.

Of course you’re not!

How writers keep writing when their muse is dead

The muse is dead; and with her, your desire to write.

You no longer feel the urge to tell that story in your head. You no longer feel the need to get the words out. You have no interest in putting in the work required of a writer; because, well, the underlying motivation that inspired you to start writing in the first place, is gone.

This isn’t like writer’s block where you know exactly what you want to write, but don’t know how to go about doing it; although, it’s just as dangerous, and just as difficult to deal with. This is like a punch to the gut that knocks all of the creative energy out of you.

With writer’s block, you stare at a blank screen and a blinking cursor; but when the muse dies, you’re not even motivated enough to sit in the chair—and that’s not even the worst of it all. The worst part this is how sudden this can come on.

There is no warning, no indication that something might be wrong; you simply wake up one morning to discover that your inspiration, drive, excitement, and motivation to write are, just, gone.

What else could it be? Your muse is dead.