November 12th, 2025

Why hello there!

Welcome to my blog. If you are new here, consider subscribing to receive notifications every time I get around to writing a new post. I’ve tried to come up with many different writing pieces in between the last and this one, to no avail. My stagnation in writing came to a point where I had to ask my friends for ideas or prompts. Now, seated in a quiet library with minimal distractions, I hope I might be able to get somewhere in this writing’s topic: writer’s block.

I do believe it looks different for everyone. Sometimes frustrating or other times disheartening. In a way, my own writers block seemed to manifest itself as a steady silence I have been torturing again and again to hopefully yell out some sort of beautiful sound.  In the day to day life of chaos, and in a time period of that one economic word starting with an r which must be whispered quietly, I think now, more than ever, would be a fitting time to discuss what this writer has come to known as writers block. I hope my readers are able to find something of use in these words that I sifted out from chaos. Enjoy.

What is Writer’s block?

To put it simply, writer’s block is not knowing what or how to write. But not of your own accord. Be it how many prompts or ideas come to mind, there is a debilitating feeling that circulates and suffocates your brain from connecting to your fingers. Typing or writing felt foreign. For me, at least, I know it did. It has been nearly two months since my previous writing, “Silence and Compliance“. In an interesting turn of events, this writer became compliant with her writer’s block, slowing down and accepting the block without putting up a fight. I am still uncertain whether or not this was the “right” thing to do. I am headstrong at times, so fighting my way through it seems like it would have been the “smarter” choice. Would the words I would’ve forced out have been better than the lingering and regressive silence that replaced them? I will never know. But now, I hope to look towards what writer’s block could mean, and in my case, how it manifested out of a series of unfortunate events.

Before the Block.

It is safe for me to say I spent the summer of 2025 in a mix of mental shock, overstimulating conflicts, and overwhelming household intricacies. Or, without all the fun words, trauma-inducing. I had already left my freshman year of college, dreading returning home for several months, and perhaps this already negative mental state only manifested my experience to be worse. I am not sure if I can gauge what is true and what isn’t. An unbiased, outside voice might be what I need to better understand my experience. As the traumatized 19-year-old in question, it might be better for me, long term, to not detach too long from my experiences and take a 3rd party approach.

Regardless, I do applaud this trauma. What I experienced was perhaps what suspended me in the air of great things. I made this blog during the summer, and somehow, I found the courage to begin posting on it. The words whipped out of me until I was breathless and hazy-eyed, but oh so inspired. My writing felt like a faucet. I had so much to say, in fact, it felt like my hands weren’t moving fast enough! I slept until noon and wrote until dawn before repeating the process for many days. How could I stop? When this writing was, perhaps, all that kept me afloat from my debilitating and fast-decaying family structure. Why, the downward spiral staircase of delusion, which I had worked so hard to get myself off of in the past, I had, full-heartedly, consented to get back on.

And then, I came back to college. I give myself grace for the first two weeks, of course. Maybe three.  Between getting used to my new classes, dance captain position, and writing tutor, I had to stabilize myself from all that I had experienced during the summer. So for this time period, any and all emotions were welcome. The anger, the sadness, the depression, the nausea, and most vividly, the fear. I opened a door to all of it. Foolishly, I had welcomed a bug that I had no idea how to get rid of.

The thought that sneakily and cleverly crept into my mind during my lowest moments was, “I’m not ahead enough. I’m falling behind,” in the whispering, false voice of “care”.  All my efforts, from this point onwards, started to look like child’s play. This 19-year-old writer and mystic truly forgot herself. But toxically, I abused my writing abilities to attempt to clear the smoke that filled the room. The faucet of ideas continued to pour, and I took everything it produced and threw it at my problems.

No, rather, the opposite.

After my three weeks of “rest and recuperation,” I poured into everything going well in my life and ignored the decay. Why would I allow the decay to fester for even longer? But of course, to get ahead. All I had overcome and all I had managed to create got lost for far too long a moment in time. So, I pushed myself harder to hopefully make up for this perceived edge that life had gained on me. Push. Push. Push. And then came the final straw, perhaps what my previous writing, “Silence and Compliance” hoped to depict. The silence of running myself off a cliff. The faucet of ideas stopped entertaining my abuse. Burnout. 

During the Block.

Days blurred together during this time. I don’t remember how I spent over a month and a half without my biggest aid. Imagine an athlete who never works out. Or, an artist who never makes art. What about a human who never breathes? My writing…

But of course, I had other responsibilities! My school, my tutoring, my dancing, my family. I put them all higher up and allowed myself to delve deeper into the pits of not writing. In two weeks, I forgot how to write from my head, except for academic essays. In four weeks, I forgot how to write from my heart, and finding writing prompts for this blog became a daring feat. And in six weeks, nearly, I forgot about this blog entirely. Pushing, and pushing. Still.

 “Into what?” I now have the sense to ask myself, and all the emotions I had welcomed in the door of my heart and brain.  “What are we pushing for? For what?”

I forgot for so long what it was that I wanted. Too long. So I was forced to listen to the uncomfortable silence of not knowing myself.  Though this writer thinks that the answer which her mind and heart, and soul yell back to her has finally arrived.

“Rest.” They plead with me. “We need rest.”

After the Block?

I don’t know what this will look like now (I say in honesty, which I am trying to be more consistent with). I have felt it before and seen it before, but really, I can never be certain. But, simply to put an end to this writing of dark times and great depression-esc, I will open the faucet for a moment more to describe to you all what it might look like. What it might feel like to truly be at rest.

The first moment you step outside at your favorite time of day. Maybe morning. Possibly night. For the sake of this writing, we imagine the golden crest of sunrise and the breeze of early morning. It’s beautiful to see, but the experience in a prairie field with the fresh smell of grass, maybe more powerful than just “sight” alone. So, let my writing take you there. Just for a moment. 

And so, there you are, a grassland that spans out as far as the eye can see. As you step and as your steps pick up pace, you discover the blades of grass are wet. They leave kisses on your legs or jeans or dress, or whatever it is you’re wearing. That doesn’t matter. For just this moment, imagine that nothing matters. You walk faster, running almost. The kisses do not stop until your legs are moving so fast, you are hardly bothered by this factor. As wet as your feet feel, you do not care.

There is a childlike innocence that swells up in your heart and your eyes, developing into a warm liquid that you’re body is too exhausted to stop. by now. You’ve been racing through this prairie field for quite some time, and so, it releases. Your worries, your doubts, and all your apprehensions. With this liquid blocking your vision, a stumble is all it takes to send you into the ground of romantic grass that won’t stop kissing you. Your back is wet, at this point. The back of your legs, your head, your spine. Your heart. But then again, none of this matters.

In the early morning  under the golden crest of sunrise, tears sap you dry and water the grass in the prairie field. Perhaps you are a loud crier or a silent one, but, regardless, in this field, no one can hear you. No one but the sun, the breeze, and the grass. At your favorite time of day, you remember finally releasing all that trapped you in stagnation. Why? Because. None of it matters anymore.  Only the sun, the breeze, and the grass. Only you. Only you matter.

Thank you for reading, love

– Ire A.