The past few days, I have been working on a jigsaw puzzle. Amidst a painful time personally and collectively, I find it soothing to center my attention on the process of assembling one thousand individual pieces into one image.
Every time I build a puzzle, I try a different strategy. Edges first? Sort all the pieces into colors? Begin with the most interesting part of the picture? Start by getting that pesky blank sky or mass of tree leaves out of the way?
No matter what approach I use, though, there always comes a point when I lose all sense of direction. The pieces look the same and I have no idea where to put any of them. The only way to progress is to keep trying: poring over each piece until I recognize where it belongs, or trying out a piece in different areas of the puzzle until I luckily hit on its rightful place.
It’s detail work. It’s grunt work. It feels chaotic.
Writers love the “planner versus pantser” discussion. We talk about whether we prefer to plan out our writing in advance or fly by the seat of our pants. Most of us use a hybrid.
But no matter what approach we use, there comes a point when we feel like we are floating untethered in a universe of words. There are no compass points and no gravity. Every step we take gets us nowhere.
When that happens, we can try the following.
Put in the time
Hard work is, well, hard. People often choose to become writers because they love that magical feeling of flow, when words are running from the pen like a mountain stream and beautiful worlds are being effortlessly created. Writing starts out as playing, but somewhere along the line it turns into work (like all worthwhile things).
Be a grownup. Keep working. Eventually, you’ll catch that flow again.
Take a break
Sometimes I quit the puzzle for a while. A few hours later, I’m talking on the phone or eating my dinner, and my eyes wander to the puzzle on the table. Suddenly I know where to put one of the pieces.
When you need a break, close your laptop or shove your manuscript in a drawer. Return later with fresh eyes and a clear mind. You’ll find that at least one of your writing problems has solved itself while you were gone.
Accept chaos
Not knowing what to do next is part of life. Randomly trying one thing after another can feel pointless and unproductive. Guess what—in that chaos, something new is being birthed. Losing our sense of direction can cause us to try things we wouldn’t otherwise. Seemingly unconnected thoughts link up. We lose our preconceptions and see things upside down (which might be right side up). Yes, it’s frustrating and even scary. The answers you need are out there in the darkness . . . but you need to reach for them.
Enjoy the details
When I’m studying each puzzle piece individually and trying various locations for it, I can enjoy the details of the picture I’m assembling. I find myself noticing shades of color, leaf shapes, architectural details, even the outlines of the pieces themselves. Each piece—and its connection to surrounding pieces—becomes significant.
It’s easy to overlook how important each piece of our writing is. We have our favorite parts of things we’ve written, and we often ignore that transition paragraph or that scene where our main character waters her plants. But every single piece of a writing project is important. (If it’s not, your editor will cut it. See how that works?)
So welcome the details. Find a way to care about every part of your writing, even the parts that don’t seem to matter—because actually they matter very much.
Trust the process
Sometimes, it’s not till I fit one puzzle piece into place that I’m able to find where another one goes—and another, and another. A puzzle can only be done one piece at a time, and the same goes for writing. Trust that after each step you take, the next one will become clear.
Oh, and if you see in this blog entry a metaphor for life right now, feel free.