For some courses of action, the first step is the hardest. Joining the Army. Making a dental appointment. Talking to someone you find attractive. For writing, it’s getting to the finish that’s usually hardest. Whether it’s fiction or nonfiction, getting an idea and writing a few sentences isn’t hard. But somewhere along the way, you’ll often get stuck.

In my case, writing factual pieces, it isn’t writer’s block in the normal sense. It’s usually that there’s something I don’t understand well enough. A lot of times, I write about something that I generally understand but I’m not an expert on. I have to pick up a more complete sense of the topic. What I’ve researched fits together, yet there’s something left unsaid that I need to figure out in order to create a satisfactory article. Sometimes it’s actually an unimportant detail, and eventually I decide I’m just obsessing over it. But usually it’s something central to the topic, and if I don’t understand it, I could be basing my whole article on a false premise.
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