Advice for writer’s block - by Lauren Wolfe - Chills

Fearless reporting, a behind-the-curtains look at how journalism is made — and an unabashed point of view. Welcome to Chills. Share My first class of the semester at NYU’s graduate school of journalism was last week. As I described the students’ first assignment — just 500 words on an underreported (hopefully human rights or social justice) story within an issue they care about — I heard myself reassuring them not to worry. “This will be fun!” I said. I meant that. But after class, I realized how odd that must have sounded. Just now I caught the tail end of an NPR interview with a writer. She was talking about the anguish of writing. She may have used the word “torture.” Believe me, I know that many or most people struggle to write, whether it’s just getting yourself to sit down in the chair, or start filling a blank page, or hating what you’ve written and not seeing how to make it better. So please don’t think I’m bragging when I say this: I’ve never had these problems. I mean not nev

Fearless reporting, a behind-the-curtains look at how journalism is made — and an unabashed point of view. Welcome to Chills. Share My first class of the semester at NYU’s graduate school of journalism was last week. As I described the students’ first assignment — just 500 words on an underreported (hopefully human rights or social justice) story within an issue they care about — I heard myself reassuring them not to worry. “This will be fun!” I said. I meant that. But after class, I realized how odd that must have sounded. Just now I caught the tail end of an NPR interview with a writer. She