Welcome to How to Keep Writing Wednesdays, where you'll find a boost of encouragement to help you keep the words flowing.
Unsavory Characters
Unsavory characters. What is it about them that we don’t like?
Unsavory characters make us uneasy. They’re unpredictable. They may be loud, shifty, moody, or even a little scary. They’re not reliable. We can’t trust them. Life would be so much easier without them, wouldn’t it?
Welcome to the stuff of novels. For every good guy, there’s a bad guy, and more often it’s the bad guy who keeps us guessing and raises the stakes. We don’t know what he or she will do next, therefore we must be vigilant. This tension keeps the plot moving forward. The higher the tension, the more we can’t turn away until we know the good guy’s got the bad guy beat.
Here’s another thing about unsavory characters. We need them.
Unsavory characters may start out as the bad guys, but they don’t always end up that way. Their real purpose isn’t to make the protagonist suffer, but to push the protagonist to greater heights. They refuse to let the protagonist get too comfortable or complacent. They insist on moving things along.
But what usually happens in the end is that our protagonist discovers true mettle—what he or she is really made of. They finally know what’s important. They also know what they must give up. When smart protagonists figure this out, they jump into action. They find their own way—they decide the ending of their story.
Is there an unsavory character in your life? Where are you on the trajectory of struggling with them versus turning the situation around and deciding what you will do next?
Try not to look at unsavory characters as good or bad, but as necessary characters in your own play or novel of life. Figure out what they’re after and how you’re involved. There is a link, I promise. It could be an action or, more likely, a way of thinking on your part that is keeping you engaged rather than freeing you from this person. What do they really want? What do you really want?
Once you take the time to honestly assess the situation (and your part in it), you’re one step closer to experiencing the life you want. Until then, your life will seem as dramatic and unpredictable as any good book or movie.