Sometimes questions have strangled my words. Why? Whyyyayyyy do I write? Queue me tugging at the shirt collar, stretching it to make room for my existential agony. And now imagine an awkward flounder as I scream What? Whaayaat should I write? Then How? Hoouhoow do I write it? Writing questions paralyze writers.

The agonized and agonizing writer? Nope. That’s myth. Writing is joy and flow. The agony is not from the writing. Questions and agony are born of comparison, expectations, and a head space that is ill-centered on product and not practice. The words don’t block our pens. It’s the fear of being imperfect that chokes creative flow.

Last Saturday I attended Dar Williams‘ Write a Song That Matters Retreat. I read her book by that name before the retreat. Even though I knew I was out of my element and expected to be imperfect, I still wanted to “do well” and felt the heat of that question-agony coming on. But I know this about myself now, pat that part of me on the head and tell her to, please (for Crissakes!), sit down and listen.

I listened, first as I read Dar’s book, then, during the retreat, to her voice as she shared and sang.

The intersections between genres have always fascinated me. I wasn’t sure where I’d find them in song, and I may be premature in sharing any findings now, but, it’s okay if this isn’t perfect or complete.

So what did I learn from Dar?

Pause

As a fiction writer, when an idea surfaces, I’m afraid to pause: get on it now, before you forget!! Dar’s words and retreat showed me pause, a dance, a plié to save an interesting thought in this corner, an adagio around an idea, and trust in the practices and process. I found permission to allow a whole world to steep and grow and take form without much interference from me.

Really

The word “really” is one that fiction writers hunt down and slay. But Dar uses this bedeviled adverb to dig deeper into the questions around her creative process.

What do I want to say? What do I really want to say?

How do I feel? How do I really feel?

And this brings me back to my title: Writing Questions. After feeling a need to avoid pause and to avoid questions that may strangle me, I learned ways to use pause and questions to help me grow and deepen my fiction. I may never write a song that matters to anyone else but me, but I learned to embrace two things in my writing practice that I feared before. I also came away with a couple of ear bugs from fellow retreaters. I’m grateful for those.

©Pennie Nichols. All Rights Reserved. 2025.