Writing from the Inside Out: Transforming Your Psychological Blocks to Release the Writer Within

by Dennis Palumbo, Larry Gelbart (Foreword by)

Overview

"Dennis Palumbo has great insight into a writer s psyche.... Every writer should have a shrink or this book. The book is cheaper."
—Gary Shandling, actor, comic, and writer

"wise, compassionate, and funny..."
—Aram Saroyan, poet and novelist

"Dennis Palumbo provides a sense of community in the isolation of writing, of knowing that we are not alone on this uncharted and privileged journey. He shows us that our shared struggles, fears, and triumphs are the very soul of the art and craft of writing."
—Bruce Joel Rubin, screenwriter, GhostandDeepImpact

Writer's block. Procrastination. Loneliness. Doubt. Fear of failure. Fear of rejection. Just plain...fear. What does it mean if you struggle with these feelings on a daily basis'It means you re a writer. Written with a unique empathy and deep insight by someone who is both a fellow writer and a noted psychotherapist, Writing from the Inside Out sheds light on the inner life of the writer and shows you positive new ways of thinking about your art and yourself. Palumbo touches on subjects ranging from writer s envy to rejection, from the loneliness of solitude to the joy of craft. Most of all, he leads you to the most empowering revelation of all that you are enough. Everything you need to navigate the often tumultuous terrain of the writer s path and create your best work is right there inside you.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780471382669
Publisher:	Wiley
Publication date:	10/16/2000
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.71(d)

About the Author

DENNIS PALUMBO, MA, MFT, is a licensed psychotherapist in private practice, specializing in creative issues. He cowrote the screenplay for the award-winning My Favorite Year and other films, numerous TV episodes and pilots, and the novel City Wars. Palumbo writes the highly popular "The Writer's Life" column in Written By, the magazine of the Writer's Guild of America, and his work helping writers has been profiled in Premiere magazine, the LA Times, and on CNN.

Read an Excerpt

Be warned:

This is not a how-to book. It offers nary a rule, formula, nor recipe that will allow you to turn out a best-selling novel or a fabulous, million-dollar screenplay. Just as well. In the end, most million-dollar screenplays turn out to be three-million- dollar screenplays, once the inevitable rewriting frenzy begins and other hands are called in to rescue the formerly fabulous million-dollar screenplay.

It is not that handy-dandy kind of book and that is just as well. Never before have so many of the smugly expert advised so many of the seemingly inexpert on how to write successfully and on how to become rich and anonymous (screen and television writers can reap sizeable financial rewards, but they rarely get anything like famous). The pages that lie ahead provide far more valuable insights and practical tools for the working and/ or would-be writer. Instead of a how-to, what Dennis Palumbo has written is a how-come book.

A veteran of the writing wars himself, Palumbo brings fresh insight into the whys and wherefores of the numerous dilemmas each writer faces, or, at times, refuses to admit. He encourages the wanna-bes and the already-ares to confront their concerns, to recognize what lies at the heart of them, to ultimately turn their demons into constructive, liberating collaborators.

The dreaded writer's block? Dennis Palumbo's take on the subject is as novel as it has proved successful for a good number of those who have had the good sense to seek his counseling. What he offers is not a one-size-fits-all cure, but rather an understanding of the sort of writer's speed bump that can sometimesseem the size of a mountain. By leading the sufferer to the underlying truth of his or her particular form of this creative cramp, Palumbo lays the groundwork for a way not around the problem, but one that goes right straight through it.

Procrastination? Doubt? Fear of failure? Loneliness? You name it; Palumbo's been there, done those—in his own writing career and in his artful advice to others. (Even in the act of writing this brief curtain-raiser, I have (1) procrastinated finishing it until the very last second of my deadline, (2) doubted that I was the best choice for this assignment, (3) been dreading how awful it would be to fail, not writing terribly well about this terribly well-written book, and (4) thought how lonely it was today—as it is every working day—to sit down in my solitary room without one person there to say "good morning" to me.)

For years, I was convinced that I could not write alone, that I needed a partner or to work as a member of a staff, surrounded by multiple partners. I had no faith in my ability to produce material on my own. What this wise, accessible volume makes crystal clear is that no one writes alone, that our superficial appearance merely represents the outer limits of the complex, teeming population that resides in each of us: the brave, the fearful, the confident, the unsure—the braggart worrier who sits not beside but within anyone with the temerity to pan for the gold that lies hidden in the blank page or the monitor.

Early on, Palumbo promotes the concept of the Buddy System, the idea that every writer needs someone who has gone through what you're going through; someone who is happy to serve as an ear, a shoulder, a kindred spirit. Someone who gets it: the work you're doing, the town or medium in which or for whom you're doing it, someone who has been to the same meetings, been given the same notes by executives, stars, directors, editors, whoever (probably word for word the very same notes you were given by someone else about a totally different piece of work). Most importantly, you need to get someone who gets you. Dennis Palumbo's Writing from the Inside Out, with Dennis serving as a thoroughly knowledgeable, compassionate companion, makes him not only a useful friend but one who is user-friendly as well. He is the buddy every writer dreams about— that is, if writer's block isn't keeping you up all night.

Larry Gelbart

Table of Contents

Foreword ix

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction 1

Part One THE WRITING LIFE

Writer’s Block 15

Your “Baby” 19

Inspiration 23

The Buddy System 26

It’s Alive! 29

Your “Precious Darlings” 32

Writing Begets Writing 35

Part Two YOU ARE ENOUGH

Simple, but Not Easy 45

What Really Happened. . . . 49

 “For I Have Done Good Work” 53

On the Couch 57

“You’re No John Updike!” 61

Part Three GRIST FOR THE MILL

Envy 69

Faith and Doubt 72

Fear 75

The Judge 79

Double-Barreled Blues 82

Myths, Fairy Tales, and Woody Allen 86

The Long View 91

Part Four THE REAL WORLD

The Pitch 101

Rejection 105

That Sinking Feeling 108

Reinventing Yourself 112

Deadline Dread 115

Three Hard Truths 119

Part Five PAGE FRIGHT

Gumption Traps 127

Procrastination 130

Patience 134

Perspective 138

In Praise of Goofing Off 141

Writing about Dogs 145

Going the Distance 148

Part Six THE REAL WORLD, PART II

Agents 159

Home of the Heart 163

The Unknown 167

Lately, I Don’t Like the Things I Love 171

Ageism 175

Part Seven HANGING ON

Commitment 185

News Flash: Writing Is Hard! 189

Burnout: A Modest Proposal 193

A Writer’s Library 197

A Stillness That Characterizes Prayer 201

Part Eight DISPATCHES FROM THE FRONT

Phone Call from Paradise 211

The Idea Man 216

I’ve Come a Long Way on Paper 220

Loneliness 223

Larry: A True Story 226

Conclusion 239