How to Conquer Writer’s Block: Tip 27

MULTI-TASK TO MULTI-CREATE!
That certainly works for the amazingly prolific Jean Reidy, whose picture books TOO PURPLEY! and TOO PICKLEY! came out in 2010 from Bloomsbury, her LIGHT UP THE NIGHT comes out this October with Disney Hyperion, and 3 more picture books come out in the next 2 years. Wow.
She multi-tasks, but in an efficient, serial fashion:
Jean says:
“Have many projects going at once!
Magazine article to picture book to blog post to website update to novel to … that’s the gist of my work day. Acute attention problem? Maybe. But also a simple way to avoid writer’s block. Jumping from project to project keeps me productive when one stalls. When ideas run dry on an article, I pull out my picture book. When my picture book ending doesn’t work, I post to my blog. I can still become frustrated but I never feel blocked. I suspect that if I focused on only one project at a time, and if that project stalled, anxiety would strike. And it’s that anxiety that creates a vicious fear of the blank page some call writers’ block. Productivity in multiple projects keeps the block at bay.”
Leave a Reply