Guest Post by David Masters

On Jealousy and Laughter

This is a story about Kavya's blog, and how it is getting around the world. I found Kavya's Yellow Umbrella blog on the front page of Google.

I'm a writer and more than anything I long to write a novel. But when I sit down to write I often feel blocked. I feel jealous of all the writers who have been published. I think: "How come they get to have their books published, and not me?" It's a stupid question when I haven't even written my novel. Yet the stupid question stops me from writing.

Recently, I decided to do something about it.

I typed in "Writer's Block Jealousy" into Google, and the Yellow Umbrella blog came up. I found Kavya's post about how she feels jealous of bloggers who suffer from writer's block.

"Why am i not having writer's block?" Kavya wrote. "Oh my god. I feel so left out."

Reading this, I could only laugh. I suffer writer's block because I am jealous of other writers. And here was someone who was jealous of people who suffer from writer's block.

Laughing helped me see my problem from another angle, and helped me to take myself less seriously. When I'm laughing or smiling, it's difficult to feel jealous.

I'm grateful to Kavya for showing me another point of view.

Did I cure my jealousy? I don't know. Maybe it will always be here. Maybe it will slowly fade. But I did start writing fiction a little every day.

And there's good news for Kavya too. I read that she finally suffered from writer's block.

So we both have reason to celebrate!

This is a guest post by David Masters.