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Out of Ideas…

cumpled paper and lightbulb

My first Friday Food for Thought came out in 2015, in the middle of  November. Almost 4 years later, I’ve written 200 posts!  I say this not as a pat on the back but because this week I was fresh out of ideas. With no ideas, I felt I had writers block, and that my creativity well had dried up.  I mentioned this to Abbey, my assistant, (you may remember she wrote about Mercury in Retrograde)  and she suggested that I write about being out of ideas. What a novel idea!!

So, as I write about being stuck and that I have nothing to write about, what do I say? This situation is no different than when we are paralyzed with a large project or even a small task and can’t achieve our goal. What can you do to get past the block? Take the first step. Take action, any step or action, even if it’s a small one. Sometimes just taking that first step is the hardest part of the whole endeavor.

cumpled paper and lightbulbMy first step here was to tell Abbey about my road block this week. While she gave me the idea, I was still stuck on how to get started. Instead of throwing in the towel, I took another step by taking a deep breath and starting to write about being stuck.  Like any other task or project that I need to complete, I just take a breath and begin, I can always adjust along the way.

I recently read about Isaac Asimov, the Sci-Fi writer. It is estimated that he wrote and edited over 500 books, and an estimated 90,000 letters and postcards. After reading those stats it is obvious that I should not complain about a creative block after 200 posts, but I still have it. Asimov’s advice is to keep at it since how we react to being stuck is what helps us. If we get frustrated and give up, nothing gets done. If we stay the course and move forward and correct along the way, it gets done. Just like this Friday Food for Thought post.

Since I am out of ideas, I’d love for you to share yours! What topics would you like to see in the upcoming FFfTs?

“You can’t think yourself out of a writing block; you have to write yourself out of a thinking block.” ― John Rogers

Have a great weekend.

Vijay

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