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In a recent article I surprised myself by saying: "Writer's block is a choice. It isn't a villain who shackles you and then either decides to free you or to keep you in his evil clutches. You bring it onto yourself..." I was surprised because until the moment I uttered those words, I believed, at least in part, that a block is like depression, that it can overtake us, without any participation on our part. I'm changing my mind about this because I have examined those times when I have succumbed to blockages. Here's what I have noticed. Several things can instigate a cessation in creative activity for me: (1) An unexpected and undeserved rejection can be a real wet blanket. I can gaze back at seminars I've conducted in which participants were coerced to attend by their superiors, and they decided to daunt me at every turn. Reeling from resistance, I cut back my speaking engagements. (2) If I use unrealistic yardsticks to assess the quality of my creative contributions, I can easily disappoint myself, and diminish my motivation to continue. For example, I had a lot of initial success with my first four books, which went on to achieve best-seller status. The next two, measured by sales and overall readership, weren't nearly as successful. I inferred "I must be losing my touch," and I cut back on my writing. Actually, as it turned out, my publisher was acquired by a conglomerate during the publication of the last two volumes, and they received scant promotion. It wasn't the fault of the books or of the writer that they didn't sell as robustly as the first four. Anyway, every effort isn't a hit, and I should know this. (3) If I believe I'm creating for anybody besides myself, I'm in jeopardy. I risk rating my work based on how it is received instead of based on how I feel about it. My focus shifts from enjoying the thrill of creation to sweating whether my ministrations will be approved. This cedes far too much power to those, who for the most part, aren't creative beings in their own right. How can they ever really "get me" or my stuff? (4) If I con myself into believing that I must make great leaps all the time in my abilities, again, I'm setting myself up for disappointments. Progress may happen in spurts or in dribs and drabs or seemingly, not at all. Why must creativity be tied to progress or to any other "industrial" type of standard? (5) When you're creating you're producing something new, and by definition, unusual. How many great artists or even scientists were revered in their own time? I heard that the wonderful French Impressionist artist, Claude Monet, was a pauper, whose wife starved to death for lack of food. His famous, lush gardens, depicted in so many of his paintings, never existed, in reality. He had no estate, no genteel life; only an irrepressible imagination and need to paint. Had he been embraced in his time, his story would have been entirely different. When you feel a block coming on, resist it, don't succumb to it. By all means, keep creating; not for others, but for yourself. If you stop, they won't care, and you'll find, as I have, that you'll only hurt yourself. buy a dissertation
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