5 Tips To Overcoming Writer's Block
Introduction:
Listen, it happens to us all. There are days in which we feel like superheroes, with words flying out of our brains like a never ending train of inspiration, and there are days in which we’re totally stumped, staring at the wall, doubting our abilities and contemplating giving up completely.
It is crucial to not only recognize when this is occurring, but knowing how to overcome writer's block completely.
With that said, Here are 5 ways to push through writer’s block in order to find that sweet spot of songwriting inspiration!👊
Photo: Singer/Songwriter Angelikah Fahray Singing into microphone. Location: The Nest at The Black Owl Studio. Photo Credit: Navadise Media
1. Spend an hour doing a mindless task that makes you feel at ease.
This type of mindlessness can come in many forms. For me, it’s surfing. Being alone in the water lets my mind wander, free to create rhythmic patterns, or meandering melodies in my head. It doesn’t matter what it is! Take a walk, knit a scarf, cook a meal, go for a run, fold laundry, go for a bike ride, etc. These types of activities free up your constantly stimulated mind, and allow you to tap into that magical realm of free flowing ideas. Watching TV, listening to a Podcast, or reading a book doesn’t count in this instance! That will just cloud your brain, continuing to stimulate you. Those can be great ways to find inspiration, but not for this exercise.
Whether or not you return home with any new ideas, melodies, or concepts, I can almost guarantee that taking the time to shut off your brain to outside influence WILL change your perspective, and help to declutter your mind before sitting back down to write.
2. Try writing exercises.
This took me years to actually implement in my process. I sort of thought it was silly, or a waste of time before actually getting to the meat and potatoes of the song. It’s not. It warms up your brain, and connects ideas and concepts in a way that wouldn’t normally happen if you’re strictly thinking about songs in a linear way.
There are a ton of different exercises you can find online, so I suggest you research some and find what works for you. Here are two of my favorites.
1) Pick a word, phrase or idea that appeals to you, for example: gold. Put 5 minutes on the clock (it will feel really long, haha). Spend 5 minutes writing absolutely ANYTHING that crosses your mind associating to gold. It can be in bullet point form, phrases, run on sentences - ANYTHING - just get it down. Once the time is up, you should have nearly a page worth of random associated thoughts stemming back to gold. Sift through these, reworking silly lines, highlighting ones you like, rearranging the order of them, etc. I promise that this free flow of thoughts will help to open a small window of opportunity toward fleshing out a great idea.
2) Write down 5, two word items, ideas, or phrases. Ex: tote bag. Spend as long as you’d like on each phrase, crafting perfect, or nearly perfect rhymes to each one. Tote bag, goat dad, float fast, no stacks, dro pack, toe tap, snow rat, etc. Sift through these, and start to see ways you can connect them. They don’t need to make sense yet, but if you can start to flesh out a flow to each rhyme, it will unlock new ideas, and new concepts. Fill out the rest of the line preceding the rhyme, and start to write a song with it. Again - it doesn’t need to make any sense at all. We’ll address that in the next point. “All of these memories stuffed inside a tote bag, reminiscing on the days we were young snow rats, dreaming in a small apartment, when we had no stacks, spending all our hours with a smile and a toe tap.”
3. Finish it wrong
My mom told me this, and it stuck with me forever. Finish it wrong.
Nobody is Bob Dylan overnight, nobody writes bars like Drake on the first take. It doesn’t normally happen that way. My advice: finish it wrong.
Don’t ruin the flow of a good writing session by obsessing over finding the perfect adjective, or rhyme. While I believe good lines take time, and that you need to know when to push yourself harder; not slowing the flow of ideas is PARAMOUNT. Ever been in a session where you’re loving a beat, but the producer is spending an hour trying to find the “perfect kick drum?” Fast forward an hour later, you hate the beat, you’ve lost all of your ideas, and you just want to leave. Yeah - don’t do that.
Finishing ideas wrong, or quickly, or cheaply does not mean it’s final. Songs aren’t final until you submit them to your mix engineer. Everything can be edited. Everything can be changed. Cutting corners is more important than making something perfect during the brainstorming process. I write songs relatively quickly in order to get the ideas and melodies down, and then I live with them. I sing them in the shower, in the car, and I try different combinations of words. I think about which lyric is cringey, which I can envision screaming to 1000’s of people, and I work through the entire song - in real time, in real life. There’s nothing worse than writing two amazing lines, and never coming back to finish it because you don’t want to mess with the “perfection” of it. Everything can be changed, everything can be edited. Finish it wrong.
4. Keep a journal
It doesn’t matter if your song lyrics are incredibly introspective, conversational, or just general wordplay; keeping a journal will help spark genuine feelings you’ve encountered, without racking your brain for them during the pressure of a songwriting session.
Whenever I have writer’s block, I go back and I read through my journal. It’s an unfiltered, honest conversation with my subconscious, overflowing with tiny remarks that might spark an idea. When you’re not thinking about “writing a song” you might wind up writing something really articulate and
beautiful. Read through your journal in order to find those moments, and start to string them together, in order to pull together an honest, genuine and real outline for a song. I promise if you do this, concepts, outlines and ideas will start presenting themselves to you - even though you never intended for them to be lyrics in the first place.
5. Change your environment.
Do you write a song in the same place, the same way, the same time, every time? Well, that monotony certainly doesn’t help tapping into your purest creative state.
I normally write on my phone, in Notes. 99% of the time, it’s super helpful. Other times it makes it incredibly easy to get distracted. Ditch the phone, grab a pen and paper, and walk down to the beach, or the park, or a city rooftop. Automatically, your brain will react to a fresh environment with a new perspective and new ideas. It doesn’t always work, but I find that it really helps.
Are you always writing with a guitar? Sure, it makes it easy to work through a song, but sometimes your brain can’t focus on the words, if you’re also worried about playing too. Record that chord progression, and loop it on your computer. This will give your hands and brain the freedom to think strictly about melodies and lyrics.
Do you always write alone? I know, I know - songwriting can be super personal BUT opening yourself up to new avenues of creation can really help to unlock a new view of writing. Find a friend, a songwriter, a family member, or any creative partner and ask them if they’d like to write together sometime. You don’t need to come home with a smash hit, you don’t need to commit the rest of your creative career as their partner, you don’t need to force anything at all. All this does is broaden the pool of ideas flowing through you, and your partner(s), which almost always gives me excitement to get home and flesh out new ideas I’ve come up with along the ride.
Photo: Musician Carter Reeves On Hammock
Conclusion
Do not - I repeat - DO NOT beat yourself for having creative blocks. It happens to everyone. Writing should be therapeutic, and treating it like a grueling task can sour your relationship with it. Everybody will find ways that will help them to get back in the groove, but hopefully these 5 tips are a good starting point for busting down that wall. No idea is bad, no line is silly, nothing is off limits: so grab your pen, and keep pushing!
