Writer's Block

Audio to the Blog

Once upon a time…

The idea was spontaneous, but it was born out of the long slumbering in secret thought of finally writing a blog again, and this time a blog on my own website. It suddenly came into focus of my attention when I was cleaning up, decluttering and rearranging my computer's hard drive and looking at the saved posts from my previous blogs. Some of these were written 15 years ago or even earlier. I read through one or two of them and realized that many ot them are timeless and could easily appear in a blog today. So this spontaneous idea came to me and I got started with a lot of enthusiasm and new energy.

Designing the website reminded me of the long-ago Myspace days. Myspace was a platform where you could create an account completely according to your own ideas. I have had a lot of fun doing this in those days, and even then I had the idea of having my own website in the back of my mind, but it was too expensive. But it was okay because this Myspace profile had everything I wanted: I could exhibit my paintings, create a blog and quickly get in touch with other artists or simply other members. As I mentioned briefly, unfortunately it didn't last long, as the platform was sold after just a few years and then completely redesigned, so nothing was as it was before.

Since I always enjoyed writing, I was looking for another place, preferably free of charge, and found one or the other, then settled on Google Blogger and started a blog there again (at times there were even three, because I always tried to separate them by topic). However, that is another story that will have its own place in a new blog post. Since all of my previous blog activities had ended at some point, but I was missing this writing more and more, last April, after cleaning up my hard drive, I got a kind of burst of energy and started this new blog project. The first texts from earlier were able to be published and it felt really good.

Then, as so often happens, life got in the way and many things had to be done, and for me that doesn't usually combine well with creativity or writing. When I was able to write again, I sat in front of the computer and nothing worked - to be completely honest. It's also called writer's block. I had a lot of thoughts in my head, a lot of ideas, not only about the old texts, but also what current posts I could add. Only I couldn't find a starting point and I slowly became aware that I actually had a mountain of work lying around me, because an incredible amount of stuff had accumulated in my apartment over the last ten years, adding to my usual chaos that I love and need. I knew something had to be done and this knowledge massively overrode my desire to write, so that I was unable to type even a single line or word into the keyboard. This was the next construction site, next to the computer's hard drive - an extended spring cleaning if you will, which could not be ignored even with a lot of creative input.

Up until now, I had basically stopped myself from clearing out my apartment, as I felt I could not dispose of the mountains of things that had accumulated in the various corners of my apartment on my own, but I need help for this. Small note for those who don’t know me so well: I spend my life in a wheelchair, I live completely independently and I can do everything myself that life brings with it, but it all goes a little slower than "normal". But when I saw the state of my apartment, I felt a little queasy and I didn't have complete confidence that I could handle this project on my own. But at some point there was the drop that makes the barrel overflow and at the beginning of May the moment came when I dared to take the plunge into the cold water. I simply started in one corner, told myself there was no one pushing me, there was no deadline, so start somewhere, preferably in the darkest corner, then step by step, one thing at a time.

And it worked. I also learned to let go, because I'm someone who doesn't like throwing things away. I learned this because I lived in the post-war period as a child. You had nothing and you kept as much as you could because you could use it for other purposes, and that was often the case. This time I decided that it was more important to me to have an environment in which I felt comfortable, even if it meant throwing away things that I had been carrying around with me for a long time. The whole process took about two weeks and no, my apartment isn't very big, but I'm just relatively slow. But the really good thing is that I managed it completely on my own. There are always a few tools that you can use for difficult situations, but if you just allow yourself to imagine that it can be successful, then an intuitive creative energy helps, which always dictates the next step as if by itself.

So now I have written the first current blog and it looks like the writer’s block has been overcome because it is now 2:30 in the morning. I started writing very late in the evening, just wanting to make preparations so I could start straight away the next day. But night has always been a good time for me to write and then there was no reason to wait any longer.

Thank you for your attention and see you soon!