The curse of vlogger’s block

One day you’re a blogger or online sensation, the next you’re stuck in front of a blank screen unable to write. It’s all about fear, as Susannah Butter reports
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21 November 2012

It was so easy at the beginning. Three years ago, when he was 18 and should have been revising for his A-levels, Charlie McDonnell made a video called How to Be English and posted it on YouTube. This won him a huge following for his internet channel, charlieissocoollike, and he became the first Brit to reach a million subscribers. Funny diary-entry-style videos, songs and sketches of him commenting on life and taking on challenges from fans won him nearly two million subscribers. He now lives off the proceeds from his channel, has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show and was offered a place on I’m a Celebrity Get me Out of Here. Stephen Fry features in his clips and called Charlie “my friend, my counsellor, my wise and trusted guide, my library, my one-stop shop for all that is cool. Like”. Not bad for a boy from Bath.

But then Charlie went silent. Fans noticed and asked where he was. This month he broke his silence, with a different sort of video, tweeting to his 493,170 followers: “Today I just needed to be open with you all about my ‘feels’ #AlsoBlackAndWhite.”

The video, entitled “I’m scared”, consists of him in front of the camera, just like his others. But unlike the videos his fans are used to, it is downbeat. McDonnell is suffering from a sort of modern-day writer’s block.

He starts: “I am not here to entertain you today. I don’t have the capacity to do that right now.” McDonnell is frustrated: “I wanted to make films but I’ve made slow progress on the one I’m writing.” Crucially, “not only am I not posting as much as I used to and know I can ... but I think the stuff I’m making is just as good as it used to be and that makes me really sad.” The “worst part” is that he’s trying to be that person he wants to be again “but every time I sit and stare at that blank text file ready to try and come up with something new I find myself terrified to create, like genuinely scared. I sat down recently to try and figure out why I’m scared of everything and the best I could come up with is that every person deep down, whether they are willing to admit it or not, just wants other people to like them.”

“I’m scared” has been watched nearly a million times and 39,983 people have commented.

McDonnell appears to be suffering from one of the most common anxiety problems — social anxiety, says Dr Jennifer Wild, Consultant Clinical Psychologist at King’s College London. “When there is pressure to perform, people suffering from social anxiety become convinced that if what they are doing is not excellent they might as well do nothing.”

Poppy Dinsey, 25, of fashion blog WIWT.com, adds: “With online content there is a constant army of strangers asking what you are going to do next and when, and they do it directly on Twitter and in comment threads. It’s good to be honest about problems. There’s no point forcing something.”

Whether you call it second book syndrome or the difficult second album, this is an age-old problem. Beethoven’s fallow period lasted seven years, from 1813 to 1820, when he wrote just seven pieces. Coleridge, de Quincey and Berlioz all had to take opium for stimulation and even JK Rowling says she worried that her period of writers’ block would last for ever: “You lose the threads, you worry if you’ll ever be able to pick them up again.”

But this modern form of creativity is particularly vulnerable to social anxiety, says Dr Wild. With so many Twitter followers, and two million people commenting on his YouTube channel, McDonnell is very much in the limelight, which can exacerbate fears about how you come across to others, says Dr Wild. McDonnell says: “When I try and make stuff what holds me back isn’t the idea that maybe it’s not going to be very good. It’s maybe you won’t like this and that by extension you won’t like me so I run away and don’t do anything at all.”

This is a classic tactic, says Dr Wild, and can be damaging. “You’ve got to stop focusing on your fears. Instead of thinking about what might happen, concentrate on what is happening. Focus away from yourself. Don’t get stuck with perfectionist values. Although the blank screen is frightening, try to write something, then you can go back and edit it.” Author Polly Samson has a healthy attitude. She says, “as a writer you have peaks and troughs … you musn’t call it writer’s block. That sounds much too serious.”

McDonnell says although posting the video was “frightening”, and the fear “isn’t the kind that I can just switch off”, the messages he has received have helped a lot. “I’m much more in control of it now. That, and I also feel ready to get through it. I can see the other side. Undoubtedly what’s helped me the most has been your support.”

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