I have been writing for Odyssey for about 7 months now. And let me tell you, coming up with a new (and hopefully original) idea for an article each week is a lot more difficult than I thought it would be when I signed up. Trying to come up with something to say involves a complicated balance of finding something that interests me, something I feel knowledgeable enough talking about that I don't sound like a ranting and raving lunatic who is uneducated on the issue she is trying to discuss, and/or something that I feel is personal enough to interest people but so personal that I don't feel comfortable putting it out there on the Internet for people to see forever. That being said, after finding this balance in topics for the past several months, I have recently reached a roadblock. After contemplating this for quite a while today trying to come up with my most recent article, I realized that I am currently experiencing "writers' block."

So now I am going to try to do my best to write a rather meta article: to write an article, while struggling to do so, on what it is like to write an article with writers' block. Does that make sense? I'm not sure it does, but for a lack of a better thing to write about, I am going to try to do it anyway. So bear with me.

In my average attempt at writing one of these articles, I guess what normally happens is I come up with an idea. Sometimes it is sparked by something that has happened throughout my week. Sometimes it comes from something I heard someone talking about or I ask a friend to randomly come up with a topic. Occasionally, I even have a brainstorming moment where I come up with various topic ideas that I fill in with actual articles at a later date. But having run out of those premade templates and sitting alone in my room without someone to consult, I have reached the block on my mental road.

Assuming that by this stage I have hit a mental block, I would then move on to actually writing the article. I'd like to proudly say that I put a ton of time and thought and effort and proofreading into every single article that I write. Saying so, however, would be lying. In all honesty, I usually spend about half an hour writing an article, read it over once or twice, and then submit it to our editing platform. After that, hopefully, I remember to check it again for edits and *maybe* remember to share it on social media. Hey, everybody has busy days, right?

But, alas, I did hit a mental block this week. I have run out of things to say. The mental well has run dry. I have been unable to tap into my mental encyclopedia for a new topic to write about. (Great, now I've even writers' blocked my way out of cheesy metaphors for having writers' block.) Regardless, I have no new ideas, and I have hit my average 500 words. (535 to be exact by the end of this sentence.) So hopefully I'll come up with a better idea for next week!