When your words get stuck

You’ve got the urge. You want to write your life story for your children and your grandchildren. Now's the day you're going to start.

So you sit down, fingers poised on pen or keyboard.

And then a terrible thing happens.

You freeze.

The words are there, but you can’t get them started. You’re like a stalled car on a cold day.

Don’t be discouraged. The solution is easier than you might think.

It’s always in the first simple sentence. You just have to release it from the tangle in your head. Once you’ve got that, the rest is more likely to fall into place.

Your brain can be temperamental, though, like a two-year-old clutching to a favourite toy: it just won’t let go. So you have to sweeten it, schmooze it, appeal to it, coach it bit by bit out into the open.

One idea is to carry a pen and small pad of paper around as you go about your daily routine. When you think of a few words or something you want to remember to say, jot them down in your notebook. (It doesn’t matter how rough your notes are – no one will see them but you.)

And then, when you have a few notes, sit down again with your computer (or a sheet of paper if you’re writing long-hand). Use your notes to write one sentence. Just one. Don’t write anything else.

Look at your sentence. And then: GO.

Write anything that comes into mind, anything your first sentence triggers. Write without stopping, without worrying about spelling or grammar or punctuation or anything else. Just write.

Writing with pen and paper rather than a keyboard is a trick some writers use when they get stuck. It seems to be a brain thing – maybe it’s slower, maybe it’s more intimate. But when a computer keyboard doesn’t seem to inspire you, or if you don’t like or use computers, do it the old-fashioned way. It’s like writing a letter to a friend. Sometimes it’s easier. Sometimes the words just come out more naturally.

Once you know your first sentence is there on any topic at all, it’s like money in the bank. You can leave it there. Make a cup of tea, chat with a neighbour, go for a walk. It doesn’t matter. Your sentence is there waiting for you; the motor’s running.

Now all you need to do is to take it for a ride.

You’ll see. Try it. Happy storytelling!