Professionals Don't Get Writer's Block
A new Change Log comic and thoughts about coming up with ideas.
If you do anything creative, eventually you’ll find yourself staring at a blank page or screen thinking you’ve used up all of your creativity and you’ll never be able to create anything ever again. It doesn’t matter what level you’re at.
I’ve been there too many times to count.
I guess that’s a good thing. It’s kind of like flying on an airplane. The first time it happens to you it’s mildly terrifying and you wonder if you’ll survive. When it happens a lot, there’s still that thought in the back of your mind that you might crash into the side of a mountain, but you’ve survived it before so probably you’ll be fine.
The blank page, for an artist without a solid idea, will always be intimidating, though.
I’ve found that it does help to keep a running list of ideas to pull you out of the spiral.
The thing that I’ve run into, though, is the thought of “wait, I already don’t have any ideas, how can I create an entire list of them?!”
For me, sitting down to a blank screen is never conducive to coming up with ideas. They always come when you’re not trying so hard to find them… in the shower, mowing the lawn, waking up from a dream in the middle of the night. Ok, maybe not that last one… it can have some weird results.
If I was a much cooler person, I would tell you that I carry my sketchbook with me at all times and whenever an idea hits I pull it out and take a note, or better yet, I just sketch it out right there on the spot.
That’s not a real thing, though. I don’t believe anyone who says they do that.
But the good thing is, we live in the 2020s and we carry a great note-taking device with us all the time. So it is realistic to pull out our phones whenever an idea or interesting thought hits us and write it down.
One other thing I’ll say, from personal experience… it’s much easier to come up with ideas if you’re not tired all the time. When I was younger, I would stay up until 2 or 3 in the morning making comics and go to my full time job the next day. Now, in my 40s, I believe that would actually kill me. Even back then, though, I think I would have benefitted, creatively, from having more sleep. That’s probably a blanket statement I’m comfortable throwing out there.
See what I did there… with the sleep pun… ok I’ll see myself out.
Note on today’s comic: the first panel was an homage to one of the best memes… the stick figure guy looking at a computer. I have no idea who created that but if anyone knows, let me know so I can give a proper shout out.
Thanks for reading! If you want to see more of my artwork/sketches/ramblings, follow me on X and here on Substack Notes. And if you really want to support me, I have a store!
Also, if you’re into political cartoons, I have another newsletter called Political Nomad with a new comic every Thursday.
Have a great week!
-Brad