Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Originally posted on Medium

There it is; that road block that anyone who writes dreads.

“I have nothing to say!”

You log onto Medium with a gazillion different thoughts in your head, yet none of them seem to have enough substance to write about, yet you click on “new story” because you are certain the inspiration will hit you once you’ve done that. Except that it doesn’t.

Then there is that cursor on the blank page. It just keeps blinking at you, taunting you, daring you to just close the window and go on with your life; hit up Facebook, play the online games or binge watch that series you stopped watching when you decided that writing was a worthwhile pursuit.

But you can’t. You’ve made a commitment to yourself to publish something every day. You know that at some point, you will publish something that is worthy of going viral in the Medium world, or at least garnering a payment. No, it might not be today, tomorrow or even this year, but you know it willhappen.

Because when you were just blogging for the fun of it? Writing was optional. When you had an off-day, and let’s be honest; when we are just blogging for the hell of it? It’s no big deal when your brain draws a blank. Now that you’ve made a commitment to yourself? All of those old bets are off, and that just makes you feel worse!

So you sit there and you watch that infuriating cursor, which used to be your friend, while it blinks and mocks you. It’s almost as if the Wordgod only gave you so many words to use per week and you blew them on the three pieces that kind of sucked last night. Now you’re on empty.

Suddenly you realize that this is something that every other writer has encountered, so you decide to write about it, because just maybe your piece on having nothing to say will speak to someone else; another writer being taunted by the infernal blinking cursor. This isn’t the one that will garner you a payment, or a grand following or even a few claps, but you put it out there, anyway, just because you feel like you might help someone else feel better about the blank page in their mind, and it might prompt them to write about their own “have nothing to say” day.

So here it is, writing family; the piece about having nothing to say. Worry not. It happens to everyone (or so I am told) at one time or another.

Write on!