I feel your trajectory. I dealt with my mother's extended illness and then death, and I could only write intermittently in any coherent fashion, though I did allow myself some incoherent note-taking. But then we got hit by Hurricane Ian and our house flooded (slightly), and I have really struggled to write anything. What I have done is twofold--for one thing, I allow myself to write incoherently, to not judge or even look back much at what starts to come out. Often, in fact, I email little bits to myself and then the next day copy from each one into a "notes" file I start for that purpose. Later I can go back and find the occasional nugget in the mess.
The other thing is what you're doing already by posting this, which is to reach out to other writers. I've done this in a variety of ways--just talking to friends about writing or attending online readings, just to start to get it back into my head. But I've also taken a few one-day or four-week online mini-workshops of a generative nature, just to get things flowing again. It's really helped me when other things are demanding my attention to have "assignments" and an hour a week to set aside.
Sometimes, I think we just have to let ourselves be human first. There is a lot of mythology around "being a writer." I have found that generally destructive. Trust yourself.
For me it's like going back to working out. Or what I've heard about working out. I don't actually work out. But I warm up those muscles first with a quick revision here and a new ending paragraph there. And then I spend time breaking the work I need to do into a list. I love making lists so I linger on this as long as I can. Then, probably the next time I write, I do one thing on the list and cross it off with a flourish. Mainly, I don't expect to be able to lift the heavy weights like I used to for a while. If ever. I might have a new normal.
I feel your trajectory. I dealt with my mother's extended illness and then death, and I could only write intermittently in any coherent fashion, though I did allow myself some incoherent note-taking. But then we got hit by Hurricane Ian and our house flooded (slightly), and I have really struggled to write anything. What I have done is twofold--for one thing, I allow myself to write incoherently, to not judge or even look back much at what starts to come out. Often, in fact, I email little bits to myself and then the next day copy from each one into a "notes" file I start for that purpose. Later I can go back and find the occasional nugget in the mess.
The other thing is what you're doing already by posting this, which is to reach out to other writers. I've done this in a variety of ways--just talking to friends about writing or attending online readings, just to start to get it back into my head. But I've also taken a few one-day or four-week online mini-workshops of a generative nature, just to get things flowing again. It's really helped me when other things are demanding my attention to have "assignments" and an hour a week to set aside.
Sometimes, I think we just have to let ourselves be human first. There is a lot of mythology around "being a writer." I have found that generally destructive. Trust yourself.
For me it's like going back to working out. Or what I've heard about working out. I don't actually work out. But I warm up those muscles first with a quick revision here and a new ending paragraph there. And then I spend time breaking the work I need to do into a list. I love making lists so I linger on this as long as I can. Then, probably the next time I write, I do one thing on the list and cross it off with a flourish. Mainly, I don't expect to be able to lift the heavy weights like I used to for a while. If ever. I might have a new normal.