13 Comments

Great piece Troy. I like your acknowledgment that anxiety and writing go hand in hand and I totally agree.

I feel like some level of anxiety is necessary when you really begin thinking about life and our place in the cosmos - or just the prospect of sharing writing online (eek).

And by the way I don’t know what you know, but as of yet, I have been unable to hold my breath for 10 mins 🤔

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Great tips, Troy. The top 3 / bottom 3 one is resonating strongly in this moment, as I look at my browser and see about 13 tabs open -- some of which I've had open all week as a "to do" reminder. Haha talk about anxiety-inducing. Sometimes I'll catch myself just switching tabs aimlessly, putting off anything of value. I know it's not exactly writer's block, but it creates a blockage of some sort, staring at a daunting "list", that's for sure

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May 22, 2023Liked by Mr. Troy Ford

I have a list fetish😂😂 Thanks for the tips and I hope you are feeling better.

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May 19, 2023Liked by Mr. Troy Ford

Hope you're on the mend and feel better, Mr Troy. Doesn't sound much fun at all.

Good tips, good tips. I feel somewhat lucky in that I haven't had much of the dreaded block. (Perhaps I shouldn't commit that to the page.) I am a big fan of the "just write something" mindset, though. I've really enjoying writing morning pages this year. And by pages, it's anywhere from a paragraph to sometimes a full page or more, stored in a Google Doc that is now monstrously large and could effectively be a small novel if any of those daily pages had a coherent or winding narrative. Instead, they're just: hey, look, this is how I'm feeling today, and oh my isn't coffee just a beautiful thing, and oh-no, now I'm trying to cut my coffee intake down a bit, and LOOK AT THE FOG OUT THERE IT'S ENCHANTING and etc etc.

I think it's helped stimulate things. Sometimes I've ruminated on plot issues I've stumbled over and even just writing those to the page helped unravel a few things. Even this, right (write) now, is turning into something that is just keeping my fingers over the keyboard and tap-tap-tap it's nearly 7am.

I like the top 3 notion. I'm one plagued by long long to-do lists with work such then when I get home and at the weekend the idea of life-admin to-do's often feels overwhelming. I'm gonna go cull some of that bottom-end of the list and approach the top end with a priority-cleaver and get to it :)

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good list of tips! i often get waylaid by existential angst (what is the POINT?!) but find a nice walk, or switching projects for a while, or a cookie, seems to help. :)

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Excellent recommendations, mate! Thanks so much for sharing and for your pen. I hope you keep feeling better. I'm sorry it's been such a miserable time for you lately. Virtual hugs.

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