Storyteller Quest 3

Knowledge

Without conflict, there is no story. Conflict is an enemy, an obstacle, internal or external. It can be a person, group of people, nature, technology, or even your own thoughts, feelings and will.

Designing or discovering conflict is vital to storytelling as it relates to your character’s growth and the interest of the reader. No conflict. No interest.

Conflict needs to make sense to the reader. Don’t overcomplicate it in your first thousand stories.

Conflict means desire. In James 4:1-3, James warns Jesus’ followers how to live peaceful lives, free from conflict with their family. This is a great insight for us storytellers who are looking for conflict:

What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you? You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure.

Desire is “wanting what you don’t have,” which results in conflict (the lifeblood of storytelling.) You must ask yourself and know the answer to this question: What does my character want?

Is your character a hero? Then their good desire may be to live peacefully, but someone else’s evil desire (jealousy, power, pleasure) is interfering. This pits a good desire against an evil desire. If this is the case then we better know what that evil desire is.

Or they want to live peacefully but a storm, wild animals, aliens, something is coming to disrupt their excellent motivations.

Make it even better. Your character doesn’t get what they wanted because their motives are all wrong. Your character desires peace, but they have their own internal problems that make it difficult to deal with the evil motivations of those around them. That’s real. No one is perfect all the time unless you are Jesus.

If you remember anything from today’s quest, I hope it is to ask yourself before and during every writing session: what will I be writing about insert conflict here today?

Challenge

In this quest, YOU are the main character.

Part 1. Brainstorm two of your strongest good desires. Jot those down. Then write two terrible external conflicts that would really mess up those good desires. Try to be specific and write about why those external conflicts would mess up the good desires.

Part 2. Brainstorm a conflict that you overcame in the past. Jot a summary. This can be internal or external. Write about how it made you feel after you overcame the conflict.

Now, write the possible outcome as if you had never overcome that conflict. How would that ripple through your life decisions, other outcomes, and change who you are today?

If you don’t tremble or shutter as you write, then try to bump it up a notch and exaggerate the original conflict and repeat the process.

Part 3. Make a list of three conflicts that you would never want to experience. Then pair each of those conflicts with an internal conflict that (based on the external conflict) would seemingly cripple the main character, leaving them at a glance incapable of growing.

Inspiration

What will your character overcome?

If they are pitted against…

• A person: Is that person a villain or a friend turned rival?

• Nature: Are they in the ensuing disaster or is it coming?

• A group of people: Is it a case of the Emperor's New Clothes, where society has embraced a rather strange idea that your character must overcome? Or is the group of people a sports team that your character is trying to join, despite their own eccentricities?

• Internal: What fear, weakness, shameful tendencies, bad habits will trip them up along the way?

What do they want, but can’t have? Why not?

Encouragement

This quest might be difficult for you because it forces you to look deep inside for something real to put on the page, but that’s what good writing is. It’s real. Don’t hold back. Nobody has to read what you write.

For now, let’s just grow your ability while learning to write authentic stories.

When you do want readers, remember that authentic desire in characters begets authentic desire in readers.