Day 8 - Falling in Love With Your Character

Okay. I'm now on page 15 of the script. It's bad version - but there's momentum. I need to go back and shuffle things around. I have some scenes in the wrong order*, but the characters are coming to life. I'm not letting myself spend too much time on editing, because there's too much to discover before I will have any clue how to really fix anything.

I realized today that what I was mainly doing (by overwriting my scenes and letting my characters take center stage and shake their groove thing without me reigning them in) was falling in love with my characters.

Writing is a left-brain/right-brain endeavor. You plan and plot, but just as importantly you have to crawl inside and find the intangible gunk. Today was a success because I got a little closer to understanding my window into my main character.

All characters you will ever write are you.

Sorry. True.

It's the writer's job to find the part you relate to in the character to give it soul. It gets tricky on assignments. (Well, it's always tricky, let's be honest.) It's trickier on assignment when you have to find a character to service a plot that didn't come from you and what you're thinking and experiencing. But, eventually, even in characters you don't like, you will find that little opening to crawl through and find yourself. It might be a part of yourself you don't really want to look at, but do. Try. I won't tell. Explore. Stretch yourself. Over the long haul, this is what keeps writing for hire exciting. It keeps writing exciting.

*You see why I called outlines and beat sheets and the rest of it tools. If you are a slave to your outline you will plot yourself right out of your story. It's a tool. It's something to get you to the next step. But, you are the captain of this ship - so if you need to drop anchor and go back and change things up, re-outline - DO IT. It's a tool. You are in control. (For now.)