Not the kind you should see a specialist about.
Not the in-the-pants variety.
When I was a wee lad, (heh.. Wee) I’d help my father and uncle build things. See, my dad would generally bring me to side jobs to make some extra bank, but had nowhere to deposit me. Through necessity, I became his helper—mostly handing him hammers, nails, chisels, sandpaper, pencils.
I had no idea how any of the shit worked. Houses were held together by some form of magic, hidden inside their walls. Electricity obviously came from lightning bolts striking the chimney. Or something.
Plumbing? Anybody’s guess. Angel’s tears, maybe.
The more and more I watched my dad work, the more everything made sense. The bones of the project. I still couldn’t create any of the things he could, but I became able dissect them. If forced into a job, I could reverse-engineer. I could visualize. I could pick out problems in other people’s work.
This led to doing. Early attempts were brutal abortions. Wood and spackle monsters starring in straight-to-DVD movies. Doing (and analyzing) led to doing better. Experimenting led to more improvements. Never saying ‘I can’t do that’ led to being able create things I really didn’t think I could when given the job.
Never say never.
Trial by Fire.
Third cliche’ for punch
I see parallels in writing. Really, I can’t ignore them. Reading other author’s work. Seeing the bones of the project. It’s not enough. You need to break the bones apart and examine the marrow.
Do. Experiment. Fuck up, a lot.
Don’t just stare at a lamp because you enjoy the light, figure out how the chimney absorbs the lightning.