3 rituals for writers
The beauty of writing stories and creating characters is that imagination plays a minimal role in the process. Do you have to be able to compartmentalize your mind between character’s motives, their personalities, and their settings so your characters and storylines can intertwine and develop organically while using your imagination as a key component to figure all of that out?
Absolutely you do, and imagination is what essentially ignites that process of character building and directs the story. However, while imagination is only a small component to the storyteller’s craft, it is important to note that the other aspect of storytelling that compliments the imagination is observation.
Before I get into the nitty gritty of what I mean, I want to provoke a thought. Anybody could be a writer, just pick up a pen, or a keyboard and spew out something. However, your identity as a writer, meaning what kind of voice you have, is often times cultivated by what you do before your words hit that paper.
Every writer has rituals (or at least should have them). Some are rituals that clear out the cobwebs that infiltrate their thought process, and some are rituals that can metaphorically open the portals to the imagination.
Your identity of a writer is also cultivated by how you think. This may seem basic and simple, but the foundation of a writer’s identity, lies in their own perception. To establish a perception, you must do a lot of observing conjoined with a lot of thinking, therefore activating that element of imagination.
Too many writers out there may confuse mimicking and copying other author’s characters as observing. Of course you shouldn’t dismiss studying characters of other authors. However, if you use other authors characters as a foundation to develop and build your own characters, then there will be a temptation to abandon your own perception and identity, and it will most likely cause you to produce characters that fall flat or at best be nothing more than regurgitated carbon copies of someone else’s imagination.
Part of the reason why some great authors can build characters with a distinct identity is because those writers have taken the time to establish an identity of their own. Their identities were developed behind the scenes with whatever ritualistic approaches they were invested in, which can enable a writer to discover who they are as a person.
Once you discover what your perception is, it may give you the interest to want to discover the perception of others, and that is accomplished by truly observing and listening to the inner voice of others. That’s where the secret comes from when creating characters; being able to listen to the heart of others.
You must be able to dig into the heart of the characters that you create. Living a life in a state of observation, where you can attempt to listen to the heart of others will increase the depth of your characters. If observing how other authors put characters together isn’t enough, then what are you supposed to observe? I’m glad you asked.
Observation also involves interaction at times. Each day that you go about your business, you are given the opportunity to become immersed in different possible story lines and narratives involving other people. Your influence in a mere conversation with somebody might change the course of that person’s day completely. That person that you associate with is a character, and that character could be facing internal turmoil.
Just think, what if you randomly started engaging in a conversation with the character, “Emo girl A” that you met at Starbucks? She is closed off to others and wants to be left alone. You randomly tell her, “Hey, I think you’re pretty!”
Despite the fact that she barks at you and tells you to go way down south where the flames burn high as she flips you off, consider that you may have possibly made a difference in her life.
Here’s where imagination comes in. Prior to that encounter, she was contemplating plunging herself headfirst into an oncoming truck, but now you gave her purpose to live, at least for another few hours.
Because of this encounter, she made it her priority to make posts on social media about creeps like you. Sure, you are the brunt of her harsh jokes and are the focal point of her rants, but your sincere and polite compliment gave her fuel to slander you, which diverted her intention from suicide, and ultimately saved her life. Well done, sir.
Emo Girl A is an odd human being for using your kindness against you, but ultimately, she is a character. She is a character with a heart (although it may seem cold), and a character with thoughts that were framed from somewhere.
You can observe all you want, but what is your observation coupled with? Is it coupled with a genuine concern for people? Do you have enough care in your heart to want to explore the depths of the heart and thoughts of Emo Girl A? Or is your purpose for writing a character like her into your story driven by a malicious intent to set the stage for slandering her personality as your way of revenge?
Writers can have malicious motives as well for creating characters, however the best writers relinquish a bias mindset, because it can compromise a good story and sabotage it with cliches.
You made it this far in this blog! Keep going! Now after that lengthy introduction, I want to share with you some of my strategies that have helped me over the years for finding my voice as a writer. Here are three rituals involving observation that can help to develop your identity as a writer and possibly help you create interesting characters.
1. The Ritual of Going People Watching
Although I mentioned interaction before, which obviously is a necessity, there is beauty in stillness. When the entire world goes on around you while you remain still, in a sense where you’re outside of the box looking in, your mind can be encouraged to fill in the blanks, trying to piece together what a particular person may be about.
This can also be extremely dangerous as well for the obvious reason of conjuring up your own prejudices to fit the narrative of your preconceived thoughts based on stereotypes and bad experiences, but for brevity’s sake and in an effort to not deviate away from the point of this blog, we are going to grasp something positive from utilizing imagination while in the state of observation.
Separating yourself from the hustle and bustle can encourage you to empathize with those you are observing. Again, imagination isn’t completely discarded from the process of creating characters. It is to be supplemented with these tactics. Imagine, while you are at your local coffee shop standing outside of the box of the hustle and bustle of daily life, with just you and your coffee, and you gaze outside of the window to see a cleaning lady on the premises picking up trash.
As people pass her by and ignore her, she continues on accomplishing her task, but you notice something. She too, is part of the hustle and bustle, but given the reception she’s getting, she appears to be just as much outside of the box as you are. Most of them seem to be. The same young lady with an aura of entitlement, sipping her Frappuccino, who ignored the cleaning lady, also seems to be outside of the box. She appears to be part of the hustle and bustle because she’s moving fast, but maybe she’s just as much outside of the box as you are, because although moving at a fast pace, she appears to be disconnected and perhaps out of touch with reality. What is reality then? It is human connection, and the irony is that you can embrace human connection at times more from outside of the box looking in because you have more of an opportunity to dissect and analyze a person and possibly conjure up some empathy and compassion for them.
Those were just examples of where my mind goes sometimes when I go people watching. Obviously, your thoughts would be different from mine. Try it and write down what you see, and please be discreet if you go people watching. If you spend too much time staring at somebody, they might either get creeped out or feel the need to want to stab you. Please proceed with caution!
2. The Ritual of Having Diversified Interactions
Now when you’re finished being a creep and watching people, you can try to balance out your creepiness by engaging in conversations. I understand that if you are introverted like I am, it can be very exhausting and strenuous to lend yourself to interacting with others.
However, it is worth it. I mentioned human connection earlier while you are people watching from the sidelines, but in essence, that human connection can be established primarily when you genuinely interact with somebody. True interaction isn’t just engaging in a conversation to prove to yourself and others that you can stand toe-to-toe with the elite of those well versed in the Olympics of linguistics, but it’s to actually listen as you speak and listen when others speak. This isn’t so much of a blog post on effective communication, but part of communicating is learning. You can’t learn if you’re not actively listening to your own thoughts, responses, the mannerisms of others, or listening to what is actually being said. Maybe what I’m saying isn’t new to you and you have arrived at the point where you already discovered that to be true, however, you may only apply that practice with a select group of people.
By nature, we have a tendency to gravitate towards our own kind. I’m not talking about race or our cultural associations. I’m talking in the context of the familiar. Because we do gravitate towards the familiar, we as writers can limit our potential of learning from different groups, therefore hindering our ability to create characters that are believable.
This detriment is due to the lack of ability on our part of not putting in enough effort in human interaction while broadening our associations, crossed with the lack of desire to extend our research beyond the google browser. There is a wealth of creative resources you can obtain when you can branch out and associate yourself with a diverse group of cultures and affiliations.
There’s a wealth of heart and history that you can extract from direct sources that you can’t get from internet research. Directly observing the mindset of an unfamiliar source may create a newfound awareness in you, thus developing your identity while molding your perception.
3. The Ritual of Listening to Older People
Because society has shifted and veered from traditional values, it’s common for one to subscribe to the notion that the older generation has fell behind the times so to speak and can’t relate, therefore they aren’t worth listening to for advice, counsel, or even for stories. However, some of the most captivating stories that I’ve ever heard came from those significantly older than me. Generally, I love to talk.
As introverted as I may be, once I talk, I just can’t shut my mouth, but when I did, I learned that those that I had a habit of just tuning out, had some things to say when I actually closed my mouth and listened. I remember once when I visited a nursing home, there was this gentleman that I sat down with who was there visiting his wife.
Unfortunately, his wife wasn’t cognitive enough to have normal function in her speech and was inhibited from engaging in any type of conversation. The most that she could do was randomly mutter one word sporadically. Usually it was to indicate if she needed to go back to the room or have her diaper changed. She sat by her husband, staring off into space with an emptiness reflecting from her glazed eyes as he recounted the time when they first met.
This wasn’t the first time that I’ve been to this nursing home and spoken to this man. This also wasn’t the first time that I heard that story. The story never became stale to me. The more that I heard the story from him, the more I analyzed his expressions and saw the emotion pouring from his face. Why did he keep telling me that story? Was it because his memory was failing him, and he forgot how many times he told it to me? Or was it because he was testing me and wanted to see if I was actually paying attention when he was talking? Or was it because of pain? Was it because the reality of his present situation was so painful to him that when he told that story all of those times, it transported him to a place where he first fell in love? Was it to divert his attention from a motionless zombie-like state of a woman to remember a once vibrant and beautiful young lady who he chose to surrender his selfish desires for and commit himself to till death do them part?
Every time he would tell that story of when they first met, I would see a smile on his face, and hope in his eyes, followed by an immediate expression of soberness and sadness almost as if there was a moment of realization, perhaps realizing that his wife may be physically with him, but realistically she was gone.
That same person who he once shared laughs with has now been reduced to a vegetable- like state of a person that’s only capable of producing a slight smile here and there. Whatever the reason was of why he told that story over and over wasn’t for me to know. All I know is, it was personal for him. I also knew that it doesn’t matter how tough one may be. Behind a rugged exterior, that same seemingly hard person can possibly have a soft heart. How did this Vietnam veteran who had seen unspeakable things, things that most humans would never witness, have a soft enough heart to love his wife so much that he was willing to stay by her side every moment he could up until the day she passed away? That is a rare type of character trait to find nowadays; one who is loyal, committed and willing to sacrifice his own pleasure and happiness just to honor his word. Maybe a character like that is someone that I can transplant in the world of my imagination, to perhaps give him a happy ending, or to give him closure, or maybe to kill him off just to take him out of his misery.
The point is, analyzing what made him ticked, touched me, and inspired me enough to dig deeper within myself to explore beneath the depths of a human soul.
What makes a character worthy of creating? The answer is, one whose story touches your heart and evokes some type of emotion, whether it’s sympathy, sadness, or anger. If a character and their story doesn’t ignite some type of feeling in you, then it is not a character worthy of creating. I remember hearing an old preacher say one time, “If you can’t feel it, don’t preach it.” Well, those words of wisdom ring in my ears in the same capacity when it comes to storytelling.
If there is a character or story that you can’t feel, then don’t create it. I understand that writing is a business venture as well and being mindful of the market should be highly considered also. However, it is a skill to be able to have an awareness of the market and still create characters with depth. A character comes to life when you, the creator, have enough care in your heart about the character to bring them to life! This goes back to your perception and identity as a writer. Although it may seem like I’m being redundant, it is imperative to remember this; the thing that makes a great character depends on the kind of heart you possess, and what makes a good story depends on what your heart does with your imagination.
These three personal rituals of mine are not just crafty strategies, they are pieces of advice learned from years of experience. Anyone can create an interesting looking character, but when you get further into the story, you may realize that there is this emptiness about that character; not in a sense of emotionlessness derived from traumatic experiences, but emptiness in a sense of being devoid of the “interesting factor.”
An interesting appearance doesn’t always translate to the character possessing an interesting mind which often produces interesting motives and ambitions.
Without doing some soul searching coupled with a psychological examination of what could possibly make one tick, you may just end up creating a character with a cool looking appearance devoid of any battery in their pack. Why? Well, I believe characters are only as good as the storyteller that creates them.
That’s where these rituals come in. They can help develop your own character as an individual as you develop your own characters for your stories. If the storyteller lacks the awareness of their surroundings and lacks capacity to dissect their surroundings or people they encounter as the first point can encourage, or lacks the ability to interact and personally connect with something different as the second point expresses, or fails to eradicate all prejudices or preconceived notions in order to actively listen as the third point would encourage, then there is a high chance that your audience will lose interest in the characters you create. Why? Because if you fail to learn who you are as an individual by observing other individuals, you will fail to connect with certain individuals. Just to be clear, every character isn’t supposed to connect with everybody. But, if one character you create doesn’t at least connect with one reader in your audience, then you have a problem.
In conclusion. the main thing that you should take away from this post is this; you can engage in all of these rituals, have a heart to feel, and an imagination that drives that emotion, but ultimately, there is still a high possibility that people just won’t like or resonate with certain characters you create, and that’s fine. Just as you, the storyteller, has a sense of control being the god of your story because you determine the situations, environments, and control who lives and dies, the reader also has to satisfy their need for their sense of control as well. The reader gains control by choosing who they want to love, hate, and who they want to criticize. They’re entitled to do so, it’s all part of the craft.
Give these three rituals a try and see if that may help you in creating your characters. Happy writing, and please, don’t get punched in the face while going people watching!