There are plenty of books filled with writing advice. You can follow the Save the Cat! rubric; you can adhere to Stephen King’s rigorous schedule; you can follow Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird approach.
But there’s more to the writer's life than getting words on the page. Writing involves an immense amount of work before you even get the chance at a payoff, especially if you exclusively write novels. Making art also necessitates more emotional vulnerability than most people want to experience. And then you get to the stage where you take your beloved work, something so personal it feels like a piece of your own body, and try to sell it. For many writers, it can be a harrowing experience.
General self-help books aren’t always specific enough to really help writers deal with the toughest moments of trying to make it as an artist. Luckily there are some books that bridge the gap between craft textbooks and general emotional self-help.
The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron
Cameron’s famous book is beloved by artists of all stripes, including writers. The book is geared toward a wide audience because, as Cameron writes, everyone is a creative being. The Artist’s Way aims to teach you how to overcome creative blocks, embrace the process of slowly working toward a goal, and turn off the judgmental voice that makes it so hard to hammer out a first draft.
The most famous exercise from Cameron’s book is called morning pages. It involves a regular morning practice of stream of consciousness writing, specifically by hand, to challenge you to simply put words on the pages without judging them.
All kinds of artists benefit from this practice because it forces you to take what’s going on in your mind and get it out, without fussing about getting it right. Painters and sculptors and dancers all use the morning pages exercise. But as a writer? Well, the benefits are pretty obvious.
Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert
The famous author of Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert is a celebrated nonfiction writer and novelist. Her book Big Magic is all about her creative life: how she welcomes inspiration, how she tackles her anxieties around her work, and the practical things she does to keep the words flowing.
Big Magic is perfect for you if your writing struggles are emotional. Are you afraid of making something bad? Do you get the spark of an idea and then get so overwhelmed you don’t know how to start? Gilbert writes about tapping into what could be described as a spiritual toolbox, but she really just helps you learn to channel your own imagination and change your attitude about what it means to be creative.
Big Magic has big heart, and Gilbert has plenty of love to share with writers who are all too happy to be hard on themselves for not being good enough. Whether you’re trying to make it in your career as an author or you’d just like to develop a creative practice to liven up your life, Gilbert has words of encouragement and wisdom for you. We could all use some help when it comes to banishing negative self-talk and approaching creativity with curiosity and joy.
How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell
How to Do Nothing is exactly what it sounds like: a book about questioning our obsession with productivity.
Writers are often the worst offenders when it comes to prioritizing work above all else. Maybe it’s because a writer’s work is so easy to quantify: How many words did you write today? How many pages? How many rounds of edits? How many drafts?
Actually sitting down to put words on a page is by far the hardest thing about writing. So why would you read a book about getting nothing done? How does that help you?
Because you’re more than your productivity. Art doesn’t happen on capitalism’s timeline—the more you try forcing yourself to have a book deal by some arbitrary age or finish a draft by some made-up timeline, the harder it will be to create.
That doesn’t mean How to Do Nothing doesn’t have plenty of real advice that will benefit writers. After all, Odell herself is an artist. She talks a lot about how technology has been designed to monetize our attention, so there’s certainly practical use for writers who struggle to close out of social media and get back to their story. But Odell also writes about how to use your attention in different ways, ways you may have forgotten after you were old enough to have your own smartphone.
Ask for Help
There are plenty of great books to have on your shelf when you’re feeling in need of some help in your creative life. But don’t forget the greatest resource you have: your fellow writers. There’s more to your writing group than notes on your manuscript; use your friends to remind yourself that you are never alone in your struggles.
Chelsea Ennen is a writer living in Brooklyn with her husband and her dog. When not writing or reading, she is a fiber and textile artist who sews, knits, crochets, weaves, and spins.
