Writers’ Block is Good News!

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CREATIVE MINDS: Psychotherapeutic Approaches and Insights

“Art is everywhere, except it has to pass through a creative mind.”

-Louise Nevelson

My patient, a seasoned TV writer, sat forward on the edge of the couch, hands clasped before him.

“I’ve been coming here for a couple weeks now,” he said. “And I’m still stuck. Blocked. Whatever you want to call it. And remember, I’m on a deadline.”

“I remember,” I said.

His eyes bored into mine. “So what are we—you—going to do about it?”

Good question, the kind I hope to address, among many others, in this new column. For clinicians treating creative patients of all types, dealing with their particular concerns requires both psychotherapeutic acumen and a measure of artfulness. Creative patients—writers, performers, painters, musicians, etc.—bring a unique array of psychological issues into the treatment room. And while their artistic struggles are inextricably bound up in their personal ones, they often present in ways that can vary greatly from what is seen in the traditional patient.

I ought to know. After 17 years as a working Hollywood screenwriter (the film “My Favorite Year”; the sitcom “Welcome Back, Kotter,” etc.), I retired from the entertainment industry to pursue my long-held passion for clinical work. For the past 30 years, I have been a licensed psychotherapist in private practice, specializing in creative patients. I have worked with Oscar- and Emmy-winning writers and directors, best-selling authors of both fiction and nonfiction, noted classical composers and popular rock stars, fashion and costume designers, and many other successful artists. I have also treated those patients who have yet to realize their creative ambitions, desperate to break in to a brutal and fickle commercial marketplace. Despite the variety of these patients’ artistic goals, as well as differing levels of accomplishment, many similar issues lie at the core of their difficulties, such as creative blocks, procrastination, fears of failure, crippling anxiety, and varying degrees of depression. Moreover, they often endure the self-defeating meanings that they assign to the very fact that they are struggling.

Remember, too, that the creative patient’s experience with family, friends, and colleagues often contributes to their distress. Strikingly, I have had more than one patient tell me of a previous therapist who, when hearing of his creative patient’s struggles, simply said, “If it’s so hard, why do you keep doing it?” As if most creative individuals choose to pursue such an unstable, often unprofitable path in life. (I am reminded of one of my writer patients, who said of writing, “It’s a curse you’ve been blessed with, or a blessing you’ve been cursed with.” I have never heard the creative impulse explained better.)

But my goals for this column extend beyond these patients to clinicians themselves, who perhaps are seeking to explore their own artistic expression. Over my years in practice, I have worked with many psychiatrists, psychologists, and physicians who have published memoir, fiction, nonfiction, self-help, poetry, and vignettes in various clinical journals. Plus, those who compose music, do sculpture, and show paintings. Not to mention a dozen PhD candidates struggling with their dissertations, stereotypically—yet often truly—due to procrastination. I hope those clinicians reading this will find some insights that pertain to their own creative goals. In addition to which, I will address both countertransference in the therapeutic dyad with creative patients, as well as the subtle danger of an intersubjective conjunction.

Now, as to the patient I mentioned previously. He is one of literally hundreds of writers I have treated who have struggled with being “blocked,” stopped in mid-project, unsure of where the narrative needs to go next. And although in this first column I will be discussing writers’ block, this same feeling of being stuck, or stymied as to how to proceed, is common to artists of all stripes, working in all genres.

Let’s start with the phrase itself, writers’ block. It was coined by psychoanalyst Edmund Bergler, who considered the desire to write to be a form of “psychic masochism.” (Ironic, given the vast amount of writing he did on the subject.) More problematic, in my view, is the conventional view of such a block: that it is a wall or some other unpassable space or obstacle. That is why writers commonly describe it as banging their heads against it. Or slogging through thick, unyielding mud. Or being tied up in ropes. These kinds of images are among the myriad ways my writer patients have referred to being blocked—as an implacable impediment, something to break through or overcome.

In my experience, however, this frustrating creative impasse is not the primary source of their distress. Rather it is the self-recriminating meanings that writers give to the fact of their being blocked. For example, the patient may think (and I have heard all of these):

• “If I’m blocked, it must mean the story doesn’t work.”
• “If only I were smarter, more talented, or took more writing classes, I wouldn’t have this problem.”
• “I bet (insert favorite author here) never has writers’ block.”
• “Maybe my parents were right, and I should’ve gone to law school.”

It is these often-invariant meanings that cause writer patients the greater degree of anxiety. It is our job as clinicians to explore the source of these meanings to help patients come to grips with their personal mythology that defines a creative block as a character defect, as a function of some lack within themselves. Here a thoughtful, incisive exploration of early childhood dynamics and familial messaging is crucial. The goal is to counter the notion of the patient’s perceived inadequate skill-set with an understanding of the patterns from childhood that sourced these self-invalidating meanings.

Moreover, rather than conceiving blocks merely as impediments or snares, I suggest conceptualizing them differently. If you look at the biographies of well-known writers (and other artists), you will notice at least 3 or 4 major blocked periods, during which they either did not work at all, or else their work had become stale and repetitive. Until, at some point, they began a new, exciting phase in their artistic journey.

Imagined in this way, a creative block can be seen as a natural and necessary developmental step in the growth of an artist. It is analogous to the developmental stages we all go through as we mature. Just as a toddler inevitably stumbles and falls, clinging to furniture and parents’ legs as they learn to walk, so too I believe writers must navigate and master similar developmental steps if they are to mature as artists.

For example, maybe the writer patient is blocked on a particular project (struggling to define a character, or unsure of how the narrative should proceed) because of issues in the work itself that touch on those he or she grapples with in life: perhaps they are writing their first graphic sex scene, or dealing with plot details that uncomfortably mirror recognizable conflicts in their families of origin, or the story seems to be moving into politically or socially unacceptable areas. Here then shame, potential recrimination from intimates, and personal diffidence are at the core of the block.

Or, conversely, the problem may be as simple as a genre change, a shift from having previously crafted one kind of story to now risking the attempt to write in a radically different subject area. If a patient has always written comedy but is now attempting a dramatic piece. Or the patient is known for character-driven narratives but is now working on an intricate, plot-heavy story. Or they have always written nonfiction and are trying fiction for the first time. Or poetry, or satire, or a screenplay. 

By exploring and illuminating the source of the meanings the writer assigns to a block, it has a much better chance to be understood and navigated. In my experience, this often results in the writer’s work growing both in craft and personal relevancy. Which suggests the counter-intuitive notion that writers’ block is good news for a writer!

Is there any empirical proof that this is so? Perhaps not. On the other hand, I have never treated a writer patient who, having successfully worked through a block, did not think they were a better writer on the other side of it.

Of course, as with all patients, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to working with creative people—as we will see in upcoming columns. Meanwhile, please feel free to send me your comments and questions, either about issues you are having with a creative patient or with your own artistic aspirations. I look forward to hearing from you.

Mr Palumbo is a licensed psychotherapist and author in Los Angeles. His email address for correspondence is dpalumbo181@aol.com.