Feeling blocked as a writer? Pull out a pen

Three kinds of journaling to unlock your creativity as a writer

Hello Powerful Story Newsletter friends! When this hits your inbox, I’ll be on my way to my son’s wedding! So excited! I didn’t want to leave you with nothing to read, so I’m reposting this popular essay from the archives.

I’ll be back next week with something fresh and maybe a few photos from the big day!

Ever feel blocked? Stuck as a writer? Like your creativity is a deep well and you possess only a short rope and a leaky bucket?  

Photo by Grzegorz Sękulski: https://www.pexels.com/

You sit down to write, and stare at that empty document on the screen. That insidious blinking cursor mocks you. The vast white space intimidates you. Your inner critic sits on your left shoulder, pointing out mistakes before you even begin to type.

Want to get back into the flow? Unblock your creativity and unleash the writer within? My advice may surprise you.

Close the laptop, set aside your phone. No more screen time for you. At least for now.

And now: pull out a pen, and a notebook. Or, if you prefer, colored pencils and a sheet of paper. Or maybe even crayons.

Get away from the screen. You spend too much time there, and as a result, your neck is sore and your soul is parched.

I want to give you permission to play—with words. Writing is hard work, but not always. Today, take some time to get back in touch with the whimsical, fun side of writing. I want you to journal, to doodle, to dream. Journaling is a powerful tool in unlocking our creativity, in loosening the rules and restrictions we put on ourselves.

I recommend three types of journaling to get you in the flow again: morning pages, list journaling, and prompted journaling.

What are “morning pages”?

In her classic book on creativity, The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron recommends that writers, artists, or any creative, begin each day with what she calls “morning pages”—longhand journaling, first thing in the morning, writing about everything and nothing: ideas and scraps of your previous night’s dreams, rants about your boss or spouse, a detailed description of the sunrise or the experience of your first sip of coffee, observations about the world or your hopes. How you feel about the conversation with a friend or your spouse that you had last night. Just sit down and write longhand. She recommends writing stream of consciousness until you fill three pages.

Photo by MART PRODUCTION: https://www.pexels.com/

This writing practice is not an opportunity to work on your book. It’s not meant to be productive in the narrow sense of that word, though it will ultimately make you more productive. It’s a discipline of freedom. It’s not a race, it’s letting your brain go for a jog.

Morning pages give you a space to let go of worrying about grammar or sentence structure. Write a run-on sentence if you want. Ramble on, explore. No one will read these pages but you—and Cameron suggests you don’t even read them but put them in an envelope and don’t read them for a month or more.

So, a morning pages practice means writing:

• First thing in the morning

• Two or three pages

• Longhand on paper, not computer

• Stream of consciousness, unstructured

Journaling in this way unlocks something—like practicing scales does for a musician., or training does for an athlete The scales are not the performance, but they provide building blocks and a place to develop muscle memory that will ultimately enhance and enable the performance. The physicality of moving your hand across the page as you write longhand also unlocks your brain and creativity in an uncanny way.

I’ve been thinking about a book I may want to write. So far, I have a collection of ideas, all of which feel scattered and disconnected. I could sit and force an outline. But instead, I am restarting my morning pages habit. Care to join me? I’d love to see what happens to all of us if we tried this for a month.

What is list journaling?

Another journaling method is list journaling. I have always kept a journal of some sort—typically a combination of morning pages and list journaling. I write prayers or affirmations. I always make a gratitude list. I ramble about my kids, my marriage, the work I’m doing or not doing. Sometimes it includes rants or long diatribes to put in God’s suggestion box. I don’t self-judge because no one except me will ever read it.

A few of my journals

List journaling also frees us from performance pressure. We write fragments, in a list. Not carefully crafted prose or poetry, although that may spring forth as you engage in these journaling practices. List journaling invites short, focused ideas, not sentences. It banishes anxiety because anyone can make a list. You could list:

• Goals. What you want to accomplish that day, week or month. Break down big goals into smaller, actionable steps.

• Gratitude. List three things you’re grateful for. Make them different and specific each day. You’ll find you’ll start to pay closer attention to your life—always a plus for a writer.

• Worries. Somehow, writing down worries deflates their power. List three things you’re stressed or scared about. Release those burdens to God.

• Prayers. I label this list “intercessions” in my journal—and old-fashioned faith word for prayers on behalf of others. Listing them wards off distraction. I’m praying about for friends, family. I’m asking for wisdom and discernment, direction. I’m listening for guidance.

• Crazy ideas. If nothing was in your way, what would you write? Where would you go? What would you do? These are goals before they are goals. They’re dreams, what if’s, wild possibilities. They’re seeds you scatter, but who knows what they will bloom into?

How can I use journaling prompts?

Another journaling method is to use prompts that get you going. A quick search online will produce a trove of journaling prompts—simple questions to which you can respond by writing.

The grateful.org website (a site all about gratitude—how amazing is that?) has a page of them, and offers a new prompt each day. They include questions like:

• What time of day is most peaceful for me? Why?

• How do I show people that I honor them?

• What is something new I could try this week?

• What is throwing you off course today? What beneficial gifts are coming your way? Where will you focus?

• What situation are you facing right now where you need God’s comforting presence, like a mother with a young child?

How do I find time to journal?

If you’re trying to find time to write, you may think—on top of my work in progress, I’ve also got to journal? I need to write more words? Do I have that many words in me? I’m so busy! I don’t have time!

Journaling rescues us from that scarcity mindset. When we journal (without counting words or worrying about self-editing) we find an abundance we didn’t know possible. Journaling doesn’t drain the well, it primes it. Journaling transforms us, takes us from the dry riverbank into the wild current of creativity.

We don’t find time—we make it. And that time that we make infuses the rest of our day with power and productivity. Trust me on this.

I know some writers who like to journal on their computer, by typing. For most of us, typing is faster. But is faster the point? No. But writing by hand unlocks a different part of our brain—our more creative, artistic, childlike part that we need in order to gain a fresh way to look at the world. That is the benefit of longhand journaling—it slows us down, forces us to listen to our own thoughts, it unlocks our creativity. It leaves room for doodling or sketching, if the mood strikes us. Something magical happens when we take a pen and fill a blank page.

Want to get unstuck, make your writing more powerful? Access that deep well? Try journaling.

P.S. Leave a comment to tell me about your journaling experiences—good, bad, whatever!