The Easter Bunny and The Myth of Writer’s Block
by Susan Scharfman
If you think you suffer from writer's block don't be alarmed. There's a simple antidote approved by the International Psychiatric Association of Non-Thinkers. Sufferers have only to stop thinking, then write. You are a blank page until your birth starts its life story. You didn't have to think about your life. It spontaneously began its drama of comedy and tragedy. And since heart is the infinite well that never runs dry, and mind is the infinite journalist that never shuts up, how can you possibly believe what comes from the heart will produce blank pages? Mystics tell us we are not our story, but stories are what writers do, not what they are.
No Such Thing As Writer's Block
You are a wellspring of infinite possibilities. Unless you're in a coma, there's no such thing as writer's block. Staring at a blank page, and agonizing over how to begin or end a story is the ultimate fiction. If you think you don't know what to write, or can't finish what you're writing, you probably think too much. Stop. Go fishing. Dig your toes into the sand, watch and listen to the ocean. Take your time when you hug a tree. It will hug you back. Walk the dog and enjoy the incomparable sweetness of your devoted best friend. Indian ashrams are good spaces for connecting to inner silence. But creative intelligence, the silent, formless essence of your being is right where you are—the awareness that gives rise to your creativity is you.
Having sold over 350 million copies of his books, Stephen King is one of the most successful writers of our time. Love his genre or hate it, his philosophy regarding fiction rings true: “Fiction is the truth inside the lie.” Life happens and often it becomes the basis for an author’s fiction.
Brief Encounter With The Easter Bunny
I’m pulling out of the supermarket parking lot when I spot an old woman with a cane aimlessly wandering around the lot. Elegantly dressed in jaunty pink straw hat with white feathers, rose pink pants suit with white ruffle blouse and shiny patent leather shoes—you'd have to be blind to miss her. Add puffy white cheeks to those feathers and she'd look like the Easter Bunny. I stop, get out of my car to see if I can help. “Are you all right?” I ask. "Oh I'm fine," she says, and then points with her cane. "I think my car’s over there. Will you walk with me?" As we stroll toward her car, her arm through mine, she proceeds to reel off her story—without punctuation.
"My husband was a World War II bomber pilot shot down over Germany, captured and held in a prisoner-of-war camp for two years…after escaping he was brought back and severely punished…when the war ended he returned home but was recalled to fly jets in the Korean War…he died several years after returning to the states…but not before I had a set of twin boys, then a girl, all of whom I raised mostly on my own. Don't see them much anymore. I love the Boston Red Sox, don't you? And that man, Eckhart Tolle, who lives only in the now, which I try to do every day. Thanks for listening to me because mostly I'm invisible and my family live overseas and I especially miss them during holidays."
That encounter with a survivor of the vanishing "Greatest Generation," the one that wrote 20th century history with its ultimate sacrifices, the one that never complains, remains with me. In the small community in which I live, I had never seen this woman before and have not seen her since. Sometimes I think I dreamed her up. But honestly, it's not fiction. Her warmth and openness are reminders that the journey from existence to living is the short but often elusive distance from the head to the heart.
The Secrets That Haunt Us
After foot surgery I had to spend a month in a rehab facility. My roommate Karen was a tiny woman in her late eighties (the same WWII generation as the pink lady in the parking lot). We got along fine except for one thing. Every night I was awakened by bright lights and loud television. It was the Easter-Passover holiday season with non-stop food ads and colored eggs. I’d turn off the TV, Karen would turn it back on. After a few sleepless nights I explained I needed the rest and had to move to another room. Feeling a little guilty, I began visiting Karen in the afternoons. Though I'm a very private person, I found myself talking about my personal life to a stranger. Soon Karen was telling me things she had never revealed to her own children. Every person has their story and no one else can tell it better. As with other Auschwitz survivors, Karen had never been able to accept her past. She was terrified of the dark and needed the TV on constantly. The day I left she said, "You came here to this place so that I could tell someone."
When you think you're life sucks, just listen to your neighbor's. You asked someone to marry you. So what happened? You took a trip to the Grand Canyon and wished you had stayed home. You read "Eat, Pray, Love" and went looking for Mr. Gorgeous in India? Don’t ask. You're tired of paying for expensive diets that don't work. Instead, you listened to your inner guru and started to eat healthy and exercise. Every person has a story. There's no such thing as writer's block. As for the Easter Bunny. Oh yeah.
If you think you suffer from writer's block don't be alarmed. There's a simple antidote approved by the International Psychiatric Association of Non-Thinkers. Sufferers have only to stop thinking, then write. You are a blank page until your birth starts its life story. You didn't have to think about your life. It spontaneously began its drama of comedy and tragedy. And since heart is the infinite well that never runs dry, and mind is the infinite journalist that never shuts up, how can you possibly believe what comes from the heart will produce blank pages? Mystics tell us we are not our story, but stories are what writers do, not what they are.
No Such Thing As Writer's Block
You are a wellspring of infinite possibilities. Unless you're in a coma, there's no such thing as writer's block. Staring at a blank page, and agonizing over how to begin or end a story is the ultimate fiction. If you think you don't know what to write, or can't finish what you're writing, you probably think too much. Stop. Go fishing. Dig your toes into the sand, watch and listen to the ocean. Take your time when you hug a tree. It will hug you back. Walk the dog and enjoy the incomparable sweetness of your devoted best friend. Indian ashrams are good spaces for connecting to inner silence. But creative intelligence, the silent, formless essence of your being is right where you are—the awareness that gives rise to your creativity is you.
Having sold over 350 million copies of his books, Stephen King is one of the most successful writers of our time. Love his genre or hate it, his philosophy regarding fiction rings true: “Fiction is the truth inside the lie.” Life happens and often it becomes the basis for an author’s fiction.
Brief Encounter With The Easter Bunny
I’m pulling out of the supermarket parking lot when I spot an old woman with a cane aimlessly wandering around the lot. Elegantly dressed in jaunty pink straw hat with white feathers, rose pink pants suit with white ruffle blouse and shiny patent leather shoes—you'd have to be blind to miss her. Add puffy white cheeks to those feathers and she'd look like the Easter Bunny. I stop, get out of my car to see if I can help. “Are you all right?” I ask. "Oh I'm fine," she says, and then points with her cane. "I think my car’s over there. Will you walk with me?" As we stroll toward her car, her arm through mine, she proceeds to reel off her story—without punctuation.
"My husband was a World War II bomber pilot shot down over Germany, captured and held in a prisoner-of-war camp for two years…after escaping he was brought back and severely punished…when the war ended he returned home but was recalled to fly jets in the Korean War…he died several years after returning to the states…but not before I had a set of twin boys, then a girl, all of whom I raised mostly on my own. Don't see them much anymore. I love the Boston Red Sox, don't you? And that man, Eckhart Tolle, who lives only in the now, which I try to do every day. Thanks for listening to me because mostly I'm invisible and my family live overseas and I especially miss them during holidays."
That encounter with a survivor of the vanishing "Greatest Generation," the one that wrote 20th century history with its ultimate sacrifices, the one that never complains, remains with me. In the small community in which I live, I had never seen this woman before and have not seen her since. Sometimes I think I dreamed her up. But honestly, it's not fiction. Her warmth and openness are reminders that the journey from existence to living is the short but often elusive distance from the head to the heart.
The Secrets That Haunt Us
After foot surgery I had to spend a month in a rehab facility. My roommate Karen was a tiny woman in her late eighties (the same WWII generation as the pink lady in the parking lot). We got along fine except for one thing. Every night I was awakened by bright lights and loud television. It was the Easter-Passover holiday season with non-stop food ads and colored eggs. I’d turn off the TV, Karen would turn it back on. After a few sleepless nights I explained I needed the rest and had to move to another room. Feeling a little guilty, I began visiting Karen in the afternoons. Though I'm a very private person, I found myself talking about my personal life to a stranger. Soon Karen was telling me things she had never revealed to her own children. Every person has their story and no one else can tell it better. As with other Auschwitz survivors, Karen had never been able to accept her past. She was terrified of the dark and needed the TV on constantly. The day I left she said, "You came here to this place so that I could tell someone."
When you think you're life sucks, just listen to your neighbor's. You asked someone to marry you. So what happened? You took a trip to the Grand Canyon and wished you had stayed home. You read "Eat, Pray, Love" and went looking for Mr. Gorgeous in India? Don’t ask. You're tired of paying for expensive diets that don't work. Instead, you listened to your inner guru and started to eat healthy and exercise. Every person has a story. There's no such thing as writer's block. As for the Easter Bunny. Oh yeah.
