19 November 2012
It’s a Process It is happening right now at this very moment. All of the frustration that was built up within me before these exact words were even placed in the order as you are reading it is slowly fading away. This is what always happens—always. But what is “this” and why is it so frustrating? In this situation, “this” is something that I and apparently some other individuals call “student writer’s block.” A “block” that is the result of papers I am assigned from any subject I’ve had to do, and they all start off the same way every time—the blank stare.
The heading and page numbers are all set, and the title is done to the point where it is not overly extravagant nor too simple. Now it is just the matter of starting off the paper and introduces the topic in a way that will keep the reader going, which is a difficult task all on its own. I stare at the mass of white space, waiting as though I am expecting it to magically fill with my thoughts to the upmost perfection, but to progress with nothing. The same feeling of frustration starts to creep back slowly boiling my blood as the emptiness mocks me.; starting off a paper is the worst part. When all seems lost, a thought becomes clear in the jumble, and I begin to write.
Ideas start to pour, and the exhilaration heightens as the sentences start to form as I had imagined. At this point frustration is behind me and is instead replaced by a slight sense of joy like a child getting praised for their hard work. Positive thoughts like “I might actually pull this off” are said, and I actually believe it. Everything seems blissful, but then it happens; I hit the dreaded wall. That very last becomes yet another “lost train of thought..”
“No!” I yell out in protest to this obstacle that has just ruined my streak and is preventing me from continuing. I rest my head down on the desk trying to not lose my mind. Now what? My mind is blank, the broken trail of a thought is left lingering unfinished on the screen, and the feeling of defeat has engulfed me. I sit motionless; trying to remember what I was trying to say.
Seeing the time fly past before my eyes, I finally accept the fact that the idea will not come back to me for a while, so I continue onto a whole new one that will lead into my conclusion. This is one of the most crucial parts to an essay because it is what I will leave the reader off with. I think about what exactly I want the reader to continue thinking about even though the paper is done. Once I have it, I let the phrases formed within my head transfer through the works of my hands into the blankness, and hope for the best that I have accomplished what was needed.
With this process in mind and my struggles through it, I can’t help but wonder if others have come to notice it as much as I have. Before conducting this particular subject, I would complain about having a paper assigned, but would notice that the idea that I was actually dreading is the process itself. In fact, the whole experience is something I have always dreaded throughout the years.
When thinking about it, I noticed that the idea that the paper is centered around does not necessarily affect the process, nor does the subject to which the paper was assigned from. In either case, writing the paper is a struggle, and it ultimately takes time. With that said, this lead me to wonder if others have noticed this struggle, and if they had come up with some sort of solution that can lessen the strenuousness of “student writer’s block.”
Through my research I came across a journal done by Dr. Jane K. Dominik, who is a college professor that has taught fourteen different courses in English, Speech, and Drama, titled “The Writer’s Block Project.” Within her journal, Dr. Dominik explains how she too observed her students go through “writer’s block,” and comes to some reasoning for its occurrence.
One of the concepts that I noticed that both Dr. Dominik and I realized as a major source