[The Limit] Dealing with Writer’s Block.

I wasted a week by coming up with reasons not to write.

Recovering from the party. It’s Easter - I’ve eaten too much chocolate. It’s Easter - everyone else is on holiday. The rest of my flat’s sick – so I feel unmotivated too. But these aren’t reasons, they’re excuses. The reason was I wasn’t inspired by what I was writing.

Murder, disillusionment and my new tattoo.

I’ve been working on a tense conversation between murderer and vigilante about their personal history. I want subtext to turn this not-so-idle chitchat into a continuation of their conflict

With our recent changes this whole sequence has to be reconsidered. 50% of what’s there has to be scrapped. It has to be rebuilt at a motivational level, starting with what Peter and Forster want. Then moving between their heads, asking “What do I think he should do if I were him?”. The goal is to make each reaction something that boggles the other character.

And then I got disillusioned because this all felt like a sterile, mechanical exercise. So, a week of avoidance.

Then I started trying to vividly visualise the scene. I remember I tried this before, with Trace outside Forster’s farm. And so far it’s working. The scene is fun to work on again.

The same lessons, learned over and over again. Hopefully this diary’ll help me boil them down into a couple of pithy meaningful phrases that I can have tattooed on the back of my hands.