Going through writer’s block and a burnout is like hitting a brick wall before falling down an endless black pit. The first hit is instant and you know right then and there that you’re going to be stuck in a rut, but the fall is what makes things worse.
You keep falling,
falling,
falling…
and you have absolutely no idea when you’ll hit rock bottom.
Illustrated by: Vincent Flores
Through the fall, you silently wish for the journey to the bottom to be fast because you know that despite how much it’s going to hurt, you’ll be able to recover and maybe get back to writing.
But there comes a point in a writer’s life that they fall down what seems like a bottomless pit. It’s a tedious journey below and you can only feel sorry for yourself; you have no idea when your spark will come back— you don’t know if it will ever come back.
You feel like the walls start slowly caving in on you, arms and legs flailing around. Trying desperately to cling onto something to hopefully make the fall stop. Even just for a little while.
After tiring yourself out from flapping around like a headless chicken, you succumb to the darkness and just let it be. You found that not everything was in your control. That even though it is you, the author, who decides how the story starts and ends, not every story goes according to your plans.
You accept that you can’t be strong all the time— that it’s okay to have moments of weakness. The pen may be mightier than the sword, but you are only human after all. The moment you allow yourself to be vulnerable, you stop falling and the landing isn’t as painful as you thought it was.
You stand up, breathe deeply, and tell yourself that tomorrow is another day. You don’t have to force yourself to put out words; you just have to let the words come to you. You know that you’ve overworked yourself yet again, and this is your soul telling you to pause for a while.
It’s a bittersweet feeling, having to stop writing for a while. But you know you have to do this because you’re tired. You’re only human so it’s normal for you to feel.
You feel, and you know that that’s what’s going to make you a great writer in the future.
You know that despite this dead end, you’ll still be able to change the world with your words.
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