Terrifying Writing

By Jenna Glatzer

I was teaching a writers' workshop based on my book Outwitting Writer's Block when a concept I've long believed in hit home for me in a new way: "Write the scariest thing first."

My mom came to that workshop to support me. She doesn't fancy herself a writer, but she was an English teacher and is a voracious reader. She told me she wasn't imaginative enough to write, but I hoped she'd feel differently after the workshop.

I led with the most difficult exercise: I told the writers that I believed that many times, blocks are our brain's way of telling us we're writing the wrong story. Not a bad story, necessarily, but not the one that needs to come out at that moment.

There are some things in life that we need to write about, not for publication, and not because they're the "best" stories, but because they're the ones that have parked themselves in our brains and won't let us move on until we've given them life in ink. They're the stories we don't want to write. The ones that terrify us.

Pretend I just told you to write about something, and your reaction was, "I can't write about that!"

What would that "something" have been? That's exactly the thing you must write. Consider it spring cleaning for your brain. Before you can write all those things you want to write, you have to make space for them by releasing the stories that are hiding out in the dark, abandoned corners.

My mom sat there for a while after I announced the assignment, pen in hand but immobile. Finally she began writing, first in spurts, then more feverishly. I looked around the room and saw what appeared to be a painful process for many. One woman threw her arms in the air and walked out of the room for a while.

"That's good," I told myself. "She's hit something real. This is part of the process."

At the end of the exercise, I invited people to share what they wrote, if they wished. Many wanted to keep the writing private, which is quite fine and understandable. After a few others took their turns, my mom decided to read hers. It was a letter to her mother-- my grandmother-- who had died an excruciating death a few years earlier.

My grandmother suffered from an unknown neurological condition that made her extremely agitated and uncomfortable in her skin. She couldn't stay in any one position for more than a few minutes before she'd begin wailing and crying. Then dementia set in, and it was impossible for anyone to care for her properly at home: She required around-the-clock care, and my family made the difficult decision to bring her to a nursing home.

We rarely spoke these feelings aloud, but what was on all of our minds was the same: Please, God, either let her get better, or let her die. She no longer recognized us, and thought my grandfather was an intruder. He wanted to come and hold her hand anyway, even though it made him cry. In her more lucid moments, she would beg to die. But this went on for about eight years before she died of starvation, on morphine, body caved in and hollow, face distorted from endless torment. Where was the mercy? Had it come at last?

My mother had written all these things in her letter. All the questions too unbearable to ask: Was her mother aware of it all? Did she know she was starving? Did she feel alone? Was there such a thing as heaven, and if so, was she at peace now? All the guilt, the helplessness and the hopelessness, all of it was on those pages, which my mom read with trembling hands, tears falling at the end.

I broke away from the "leader" role for a minute and hugged my mother. That was terrifying writing. And one of the bravest things I've ever seen her do.

This was a cleansing for the people at the workshop. Surely, they didn't all write every little thing that needed to come out in the 20 minutes or so I gave them for this exercise, but it was a start. The terrifying things don't always come out all at once, and if you force yourself to be engulfed in that world for hours or days on end, it can be counterproductive. You can lose yourself in the process of helping the truth manifest itself on paper. So if you need to take breaks, do so. If you can stand only a few minutes a day, then that's what to do-- but keep coming back to it, even if it's hard.

You might feel awful while you're writing it. There may be pieces of your life that you dread revisiting. But rest assured that your subconscious mind hasn't forgotten, and those shadowy memories can cling to your creativity, choking its freedom, until you give them the space they demand.

Sometimes the dreadful thing is an obvious trauma, like physical or sexual abuse, a death, a divorce, or a health scare. Sometimes it's a secret feeling, like the longing for a dream you feel you can no longer have, or something you've done that you're ashamed of, or a crisis of faith. Maybe you're not even sure what it is; maybe there are many things. If you're not sure, consider writing a list: "I am afraid to write about _____________." Read over your list and pay attention to the one that pangs the hardest.

It's always important to let go of your inner critic-- the idiot who looks over your shoulder and tells you everything you write is stupid-- while writing a first draft, but it's particularly important with the terrifying writing. Lock the critic out, and allow yourself to write as it comes: broken sentences, run-on sentences, misspelled words, hazy memories, tangents upon tangents, sloppy handwriting… whatever it is, it is. If you choose to go back and edit later, that's fine, but leaving it as-is is also fine. Setting fire to it or ripping it to shreds after you're finished is okay, too.

If it's too difficult to write in the first-person perspective, give yourself a pseudonym and write it in third person, or from someone else's point of view. I wound up writing several female characters who were raped (as I was) into my screenplays and one unfinished novel, even when the storyline didn't really call for it. I didn't do it purposely, but my brain kept chiseling away at it until one day it was out of my system… and out of my writing. Now I can write about it if I want to, but I no longer need to. I cleared out what I needed to release, and that left me free to devote myself fully to the "needs" of my characters and the needs of my readers.

You don't do the terrifying writing for the readers. If you later discover that it's something worthy of publication or sharing with others and you're ready for it, great. But keep that thought out of your mind while you're working on it. This one's for you. You're too likely to write "pretty" and censor yourself if you have an audience in mind as you write, even if that audience is your spouse or friend.

You may find that after you've written your hardest story, a torrent of creativity rushes out, as if it were behind a dam. You may find you need a break from writing for a few days or a week, just to absorb what you went through in the process of letting it out. Whatever happens, you'll be a freer and better writer at the end, less afraid of taking risks, more able to immerse yourself in the projects you choose. Over the course of three days, I watched my mother transform from someone who thought she had no imagination to someone who was astounded by her own creativity.

So be a daredevil for today. Write the scariest thing first.

Jenna Glatzer is the editor-in-chief of www.absolutewrite.com and the author of a whole lotta books. Her latest is THE STREET-SMART WRITER: Self-Defense Against Sharks and Scams in the Writing World, a book no new writer should be without. Get it at a discount at www.jennaglatzer.com.

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