Writer’s block is such a frustrating experience which is sure to ail you more than a few times if you are a writer.  Even now as I am sitting here, I am having a hard time getting the words out, why is that?  Why can it be so hard to actually sit down and write?   I recently talked with a man who told me he couldn’t write anything for years and that the experience physically hurt him.  The process of writing can be as cathartic to a writer as yoga is to a Buddhist, so I understood completely where he was coming from.  And what caused his writer’s block? He didn’t know.

To me, writing is like therapy and my computer is the most cost-efficient psychologist anyone can find.  However, whenever I try to write a nonfiction piece on a particular rough experience I had, I get blocked.  I can write the story, but writing it well is my problem.  I start to think about how others will perceive my piece.  Is it universal enough?  Is it whiny? Or is it just beating down a path that is so brutalized no one cares to walk down it anymore?

I ran across an interview between Elissa Bassist and Cheryl Strayed who talked about this particular issue.  The interview is a follow-up to an interesting story where Strayed’s advice to Bassist clears her of her block and she is able to write a book.  At the time, Bassist was concerned about “how does a woman get up and become the writer she wishes she’d be?”  Strayed replied that “Writing is hard for every last one of us—straight white men included. Coal mining is harder. Do you think miners stand around all day talking about how hard it is to mine for coal? They do not. They simply dig. You need to do the same. … So write, Elissa Bassist. Not like a girl. Not like a boy. Write like a mother#$%^*.”  I laughed because I remember a particular writing professor of mine advising our class to do just that.  Of course, its not always that easy.

The two writers talk about the distractions of social media possibly playing a part, but mostly how writer’s block is still a mystery even to veterans of the field.  Is getting rid of writer’s block as easy as throwing away your ego, or is it more than that? Is it something deeper that none of us can figure out?

Author Terry Tempest Williams tell us “I write as a witness to what I have seen. I write as a witness to what I imagine.” In my opinion, every personal essay is an experiment taken on by the writer to try and make sense of some sort of idea or event that they feel strongly about. But there is surely a debate about the amount of fiction that should be allowed in a nonfiction piece. So, is what a person imagines fact or fiction? And what does that mean when they go to publish it?

Every writer, no matter the genre, dreams of the day that they will be published. But rules are different for those writing about the truth, especially when the truth involves a sensitive subject such as sexual abuse. If published, the writer could be involved in a defamation lawsuit if the perpetrator can be easily identified and hurts their reputation. Because of this, sometimes authors are urged to change some vital information so that they will be protected. So, my question is, is this fact or fiction? What does changing the information mean when it is a work of creative nonfiction? Is the author protecting themselves or hurting their truth?

Take a look at a conversation about literary law here, and decide for yourselves.