Why Writers Need White Space

Photo by Unsplash

The ring from my half-melted mocha was slowly growing to touch the outer edges of my blank notebook. Strangers trickled in and out of the beefy wooden front door for hours as I stayed faithful to my window post. I’d promised myself new pages that day.

Instead, I was invested in the foot traffic of W. 10th framed by hearty brownstones and delicate trees that made you forget this was this city that could make or break you.

I was in Manhattan for the summer with a goal to write as much as possible. Walking the same streets as Sylvia Plath and Joan Didion had to encourage something creatively — at least, that’s what I said in my head. Good grief, I was in a writing program, so I should be writing, right?

But maybe, the act of being a writer requires more than just writing. 

Give Yourself Permission to Be Bored

Most of my writing days were like this one — finding coffee shops or restaurants and commandeering a window to stare out of for hours. The not-writing created more stories in my head about what I could be writing, but I just sat there. There was too much ease in sitting and observing that I didn’t want to ruin by working because I thought I should. We forget what it is to be content doing “nothing”.

I’d given myself permission to soak in the feeling of the city because I didn’t know when I’d return again. And even years later, I can feel the cobblestone beneath my feet and smell the punk rock subway air from miles away because I was more present there than I’d been anywhere in a long time.

The truth is that writing is what happens from living. It’s the words we didn’t know how to say in order to try and make sense of the world. 

We’ve made ourselves believe that if we’re not constantly churning out new work, then we’re not being productive — we’re just another daydreaming writer who’d rather talk about writing than do the actual work.

But creative burnout happens when we’re working just to work and not giving our imagination time to explore and experiment.

As author Neil Gaiman put it on Late Night with Seth Meyers:

I think it’s about where ideas come from, they come from day dreaming, from drifting, that moment when you’re just sitting there… The trouble with these days is that it’s really hard to get bored. I have 2.4 million people on Twitter who will entertain me at any moment… it’s really hard to get bored. I’m much better at putting my phone away, going for boring walks, actually trying to find the space to get bored in. That’s what I’ve started saying to people who say ‘I want to be a writer,” I say ‘great, get bored.’

Trusting the White Space

After hours of classes on craft and character and readings at the 92nd Street Y, I didn’t have much to show for my summer — maybe six new pages total.

What was supposed to be a highly productive summer, became one that felt more like a vacation. But my brain was allowed to rest, and that made all the difference in writing forward. Oddly enough, my not writing caused me to observe my surroundings more intensely, which gave me months (even years) of material to return to. I was living in the moment, not trying to write through it.

So, if you’ve found yourself in a space where you’re not getting as much down on the page as you would have hoped — it’s okay.

This may be a time that you need to put the pen or keyboard away and let yourself just be. 

Trust that the time will bring new things to mind.

Take a walk.

Sit on your bed and stare at the wall.

Let yourself sit outside without a podcast to listen to.

It may be uncomfortable at first, but it also may be the greatest thing to happen to your writing too.

Don’t you owe it to yourself to find out?