Unfortunately, you cannot find answer to why you are writing your story in this article, or in any book for that matter. You cannot even find it in a classroom setting. Books and classes can only serve to help you bring reason(s) to surface, but answer must come from you. How then, do you determine your book’s purpose? How can you be certain that it is more than a good story? Your book’s purpose is, to a great degree, intertwined with your purpose.

Mark Victor Hansen, co-creator of Chicken Soup series suggests meditation, or deep, controlled, concentrated thought. He says, "Relax and tap into your mind, way back there in deepest, secret compartment of your mind, by asking yourself this question: ‘If I knew my life purpose, what would it be?’ Don’t just ask it once. Keep asking this question until you get answer. It may not come first day, or even first week. But it’s there, and it will show its face if you earnestly ask."

Hansen states that this should be repeated every morning and every night for 15 minutes until answer comes to you, and then write it down. He continues, “Be open to answer, no matter when it comes to you. Remember, it wants you just as much as you want it.”

A good theme does three things: 1) it describes story or book; 2) it captures uniqueness of story or book; 3) it motivates author. If it accomplishes these three things, it will also make your outline easier to create. In business-speak, an “elevator speech” is a brief description about your company that you should be able to give to someone in time it would take to ride up an elevator. I hold that everyone writing a book needs an elevator speech, or theme, for it.

If your ideas have suddenly dried up, maybe writer's block is telling you to take it easy. You've been working too hard -- you need to take time and recharge your creative batteries. Or maybe you haven't dealt with some old hurt or anger and you need to take some time and deal with that block.

Writer's block also might be telling you project is all wrong for you. (Although be careful with last one -- writer's procrastination is a wonderful mimic and he might be trying to slip something past you.)

When I'm stuck, first thing I do is get away from computer. I take a walk, jump in shower (I get a lot of great ideas in shower) or eat some chocolate. (Some things never change.) I think about project. I review my notes. I analyze what I'm doing. And I ask myself questions. Do I have all information I need? Should I do more research? Is my approach right? Have I thought this project through enough?

Sometimes I can spot problem in a few minutes. Sometimes it takes a few days. But always, without fail, I've discovered writer's block was right. There WAS a serious problem with project. A fatal flaw in foundation -- a weakness in structure. Eventually, it would have collapsed.

And by stepping in, your writer's block stopped that from happening.

Creativity Exercises -- Make friends with writer's block

I realize this might be a scary exercise for some of you, especially if you're in throes of writer's block (and I've been there -- I know how terrifying it is) but that's all more reason to do this.

Now, when I say make friends with your writer's block, I'm not talking about inviting it to move in and existing in a permanent blocked state. What I'm talking about is a way to put writer's block in its rightful place -- where it uses its talents to help and not harm you.

Take a few moments and thank your writer's block. Thank it for all times it blocked you. Tell it you know it was trying to help you and you appreciate it.

Whatever you do, DON’T fear your writer's block. You give it too much power if you fear it. Power corrupts. You don't want to corrupt your writer's block, you want it to do its job -- helping you craft best writing pieces you can.

If you're in middle of a bad case of writer's block, try asking your writer's block what problem is. Why won't it let you start that project or what happened to your ideas? Do it as a journaling exercise or a meditation. You may be amazed at what it tells you.