At the Writer’s Block

by Anita Fairbanks

There it is again, the white emptiness, my own cliff of Dover, the dead impasse that blocks all progress. Scattered words, flung carelessly, bounce off the screen without sticking. I scroll to the bottom of the page, my chisel poised: nothing. “You can’t edit until you’ve written something,” I chide myself in a maternal tone.

Didn’t I leave my writing phobias behind me when I graduated? I remember, with some remorse, those long days and all-too terminable nights at my computer that I spent scratching my scalp for words, for sentences, for any idea really that felt remotely original. Sunrise would find me through the dim glass of the computer lab, finally clucking away, muttering out loud, and gobbling peanut M&M’S, one per paragraph. I don’t miss it; why then, with the deadlines put to rest, do I find myself stifling urges to self-inflict my time with writing assignments?

Yes, there were the rare, clarifying moments on the library balcony, where I “found” my topic, and more importantly, where I experienced a genuine encounter with truth. I was never the source of this truth, but seemed to fall upon it through patches of sunlight, like sensing a deer in the woods, one whose eyes have been tracking you all along. It was during these moments, with my pen aside and my sight fixed on a horizon somewhere inside me, that I could silently gaze at the idea I hadn’t written yet. I reveled in these experiences, academic as the books which bound them, but spiritual because of the means by which they occurred, “the same light that quickeneth your understanding,” the light of Christ (D&C 8:11). My agnostic companions, and even my theistic ones, spoke excitedly of similar experiences, not knowing, however, what I had been practicing since Primary, that “by the power of the Holy Ghost, ye may know the truth of all things” (Moroni 10:5, emphasis added).

Perhaps I miss the encounters with truth that I gained during the writing process, perhaps the pride of accomplishment, but it doesn’t change the fact that writing is harder now. It’s harder to find an uninterrupted moment, as is evident by the yelling baby in my lap currently dismantling the stapler, and pounding typos faster than I can delete them; it’s harder when you don’t have a professor expecting something by morning. Why continue writing? In Ether chapter 12, Moroni hints that it may be more essential to my character than I first thought when I exchanged schooling for motherhood. “When we write,” he states (and I’m applying this to the general human experience), “we behold our weaknesses, and stumble because of the placing of our words” (vs. 25). He nailed it—my writing phobia, in a nutshell. I hate seeing my flaws on paper. Somehow, the faults I see lie not only in a poorly written expression, but with my weak understanding, my inability to communicate, to think, to create.

In verse 27, we learn that these fears, brought on by the writing process, are purposeful. In fact, the Lord gives us our weaknesses, that we “may be humble.” We are shown our weaknesses when we “come unto [Him],” and writing is one way to exercise that. Then, through humility and faith, the Lord “makes weak things become strong.” I could call this blessing “editing,” but that would flatten its meaning. While it’s true that I have prayed over essays and thereby improved them, sometimes I improve myself along the way. For example, after struggling with an assignment in French class on Flaubert’s “Un Cœur Simple,” I found myself choosing the topic of confession and obsessing over a resulting essay five times the required length. I can only conclude that perhaps there were a few things in my life that I needed to repent of. Over and over, I find that my writing reflects the issues that are of greatest personal concern to me. The topics have weight; they seem alive and jump from book to book, following me until I resolve them, or at least record them, on paper.

Moroni’s instructions are clear and his implications haunting. We have weaknesses. They can be made into strengths through faith in Christ, the ultimate Word. But we need to be humble about them, and sometimes, a blank page can help. I’ve decided to get started on that children’s book I’m trying to write, not because it will be any good, not because I want others to read it, but because I want to challenge my weaknesses. I’ll find them in my own writing and in the characters I create. My chisel is poised.