Design Character Flaws

1. About the Workshop: Hi, my name is Barbara fans and welcome to this workshop on writing character flaws. Character flaws are one of the essential things that we need to design when we are coming up with our characters. They are very important because they are very, very connected to your plot and your character arc. So when you design a plot, you start with your character arc. You do a rough sketch of your character arc. Then you sort of establish your values and beliefs and then you start to design your floors. The floors or the thing that your character is going to be dealing with inside of himself when he is moving through the story, hopefully overcoming some of them. So they are intimately connected to the challenges that your character is going to go through. Which means they're connected to this suspense of the plot, which means that they're going to be connected to many of the events themselves. So this is a critical thing to get right. You do not want to just choose randomly interesting flaws. You're floods always need to be strategically chosen as they pertain to the store. You're trying to tell about that character. It's not enough just to choose the right flaws for a character. We have to choose the right floss for this character, for this story. It is so key and so important. This workshop is going to help you do that. We're going to look at not only all of the kinds of flaws that your character can have, which is important because you want variety. You want variety of the types of flaws, the severity of flaws. Is it a flock or is it a weakness? Because those two are different things. There are different levels of flaws. And so we want to create a three-dimensional character. And we do that in part by making sure that we're giving them different grades in different levels and different types of each kind of trait, be that floss strength, etc. So it was very key that we look through all of these things. We will also be looking through, okay, once we sort of figured out what are our flaws, we need to then figure out, alright, Where do these force come from? What's the backstory on these? How are we pulling back into your character's past to see what their beliefs are, what their values are, which hopefully you've already taken the values and beliefs workshop. So you've established those things ideally, but we're going to look at those. So you'll go back to your values and beliefs that you've established. You'll look at your flaws which have grown out of those because you've already established them. And you're going to start to develop this backstory for your character. So it's really exciting once we get to this point because you're going to start to really go, oh my goodness, I have a lot of backstory to this character. You've probably, very likely almost will certainly not write all of that backstory into your actual story that you share with your readers or your viewers. But for you to know it will be so important because going forward as you write, it's going to really bring your character to life. We also want to make sure that you're really strategically designing those flaws so that they push the plot forward. We always want flaws and character traits, strength, flaws, values, believes all of your character traits. Push that plot forward. It's really important for character focused plots. So character-driven plots. If you want your character driving that plot, then you really want to make sure that you're choosing flaws that will actually put that plug, push that forward. This is so exciting because what it means is that as you design these flaws, if you're doing it properly, you're going to start to get plot ideas. You're going to get ideas for other characters. You're going to get ideas for plot events. And so always make sure as you take these workshops that you write down all of your brainstorming ideas. This workshop comes with extensive Class notes that you can follow along with each of the lessons. It also comes with a wonderful worksheet that will a series of worksheets that are going to help you design that flaw and put things into practice. Because if you know me, you know that I don't want to just teach you concepts. I really want you to then take it and start to work through it so that you can get your story down. So this will help you do that. This is several steps in on my recommended course project progression for a character design. So make sure as you read through the documentation on this page that you look through that character progression, that really is my recommended progression. You can take these in any order and learn so much. But if you're really focused and dedicated on writing that character and getting it done. I just, I cannot say enough. Start at the beginning of the Gretchen with character arc mastery and then work through, it's going to help you so much. I'm so excited about this workshop, right? Character flaws is actually a lot of fun because you want characters who are flawed. Although we actually do have a segment in this about what you do if you character doesn't really have many flaws which sometimes happens and can still work out very well. So we'll address that too. But flawed characters make the readers and viewers feel like, okay, you're like, You're like I am, you know, sort of loud. So it's very, very helpful, but we want to do it in a way that makes those flaws of work for the story not random traits. I'm so excited about this workshop. It was a really fun one to teach. I hope it sounds of interests. I hope you'll join and I'm so excited that you are working forward on a story or your own. Bye. 2. Flaws vs. Weaknesses: Developing character flaws is more complex than people realize. You can get your arms around developing character flaws than you can handle character strings. We want to begin by defining the difference between flaws and weaknesses. And please don't get too hung up on terminologies. Here is a trait internal to the character that gets on her way and keeps them from achieving her goal is clearly troublesome trait and she needs to actually improve it. Over the course of the narrative. This is different than a weakness. A weakness, on the other hand, is a vulnerability. It's something that can be exploited, but it's not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself. And it doesn't necessarily get in the way of the character's goals in the story. So let's look at some examples. My flaw might be that I have a short temper. My weakness might be that I like sweets a bit too much. You could have a story about a short-tempered woman who's bad behavior, gets her fired from her job and dumped by her boyfriend. Those two events later down the road to the eventual recognition that she has to fix said floor bad temper. And she could happen to eat a lot of sweets, which is a weakness, but it's not necessarily influencing those major plot points and plot problems that you have. Let's look at another example. My flow might be that I am greedy and myosin the, while my weakness might be that I think kittens are adorable and I really, really want one. Now, do you see how the kitten example is not necessarily a flaw? It's actually not even necessarily a bad thing, right? You can like kittens and be totally weakness for kittens and have it not actually manifest itself in some bad way in your life. But the weakness of kittens could matter. If, for example, your character is asked to deliver some surreptitious document that she suspects is related to illegal activity to a gentleman at 23rd and ten 34th Street, and she's told that if she does deliver said suspicious package, then she can have her choice of Mrs. Hansen's litter of kittens. So in that situation and not normally bad weakness, loving kittens is being exploited. So you can have a weakness that does influence the plot. A weakness can also be something that character does not have control over, like being blind or having a weakened immune system. Now, something we want to watch out for. One mistake I see writers make some times is that rather than giving their character a flaw, they just give her a number of weaknesses thinking that that will suffice because they loved the characters so much. They just don't want to give them a flaw. But what you'll see is that we want your character to struggle within herself and need to prove. So. In stories, this development plays out because the character flaw is related to the plot in a direct way. More on this later, the point is that too many weaknesses make your character more of a pathetic rather than someone we relate to and champion. You want to be very careful about just piling weaknesses on. You really want to take time to develop some strong actual floors. Then if you want to have some weaknesses, fine. Let's look at an example from literature. In the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, huck Finn, a young boy, is the protagonist. He isn't homeless boy, mother dead, his father abandoned him. And he's being raised by his aunt. Huck is an adventurous soul, really pushes back on his aunt's attempts to civilize him. This makes him a splendidly fun character. And it is this adventurous spirit that sets him off on the journey of the novel. But Huck is not without flaws. Among them being his inability to appreciate the gravity of others difficult situations. So while the plot itself is focused on Huck helping his friend Jim, who's a runaway slaves to freedom. We more than once see that there is a sense in which for hug, this is a fun adventure. It's not this life threatening situation, but it actually is for Jim, for Huck, the trip down the river that they're on is an excursion. And he doesn't appreciate what it really means to Jim. This lack of situational awareness extends to Hux Rachel prejudices, which he is unaware that he has these traits we've just discussed manifest themselves at more as flaws in the novel because they heavily influenced the plot and thus hooks own character development time and again in the story. These characteristics rear their heads and it is these that Huck ultimately comes to terms with. Now Huck has other less admirable characteristics. His social niave tag gets him into Funny, an awkward circumstance. And that makes for entertaining scenes. And yes, influences the plot way. But the way this characteristic functions, it is more of a weakness because it doesn't really prohibit Huck from achieving its mission, nor is it remedied by the end of the story. This is not true of his racism or of his insensitivity, both of which do conflict with his goal to set Jim free, as well as the story's goal of Huck developing as a character. 3. How Flaws Advance the Story & Characters: Flaws and weaknesses are important in character development for multiple reasons. As you might expect, they make a character relatable. While there are certainly stories in which characters seem more or less perfect and I can love some of these. These are often not characters we can relate to readers for the central fact that we're all flawed. And this does not mean that a more or less perfect character is unlikable. But in most cases, you will want to create characters who have deficiencies. Add depth to a character. They give her something to struggle with. Which brings us to the second reason that thought is matter. Character flaws can also help develop the plot and add conflict and drama. If your protagonist has no flaws than the bad things that happen, can only happen to her and she will only be a product of her circumstances. The novel becomes one-sided because she's never responsible for any of the bad things that occur for a float really matter in a story. It needs to create problems for the character. A waitress, this sharp tongue might get her fired. A young boys pride gets him sent to detention. So you want a character that doesn't just have bad things happening to her, are happening to him. You want a character who, by virtue of flaws and bad decisions, is actually influencing the plot. One side note on relatability. Flaws can also push a reader away from a character, which you also want to avoid. Generally flawed characters or off putting, either because we never see any of the ramifications for their bad behavior. So they can be cruel and never have come up. In which case we resent them or the character does not have any positive traits. We can also sympathize with, true, we are all flawed. But if your reader is a patient person and cannot relate to an impatient character, then she might not connect over that shared flaw. In which case, she needs to see redeemable qualities and your characters as well. Point being that you want to think of your character holistically, considering flaws, weaknesses, strengths, and how readers might receive these things. As we proceed through this part of the course. Please keep in mind that as a writer, you want to think of all the ways a flaw or strength, value, desire seeps into a character's life. You are traits will not seem real if a character's obsessiveness only affects how she keeps things and doesn't touch her work overload life. Personality traits affect most facets of life. And you will want to respect that. As a writer. 4. Types of Flaws: Alright, let's look at some of the types of flaws your character can have. There are many ways a person can be flawed, which is unfortunate for life, but it's really great when you want to tell an interesting story. For the purposes of this class, we're not going to go over every possible failing your character can have. What I would like to do is to go over some overarching categories of flows that serve as sort of umbrellas to most of the traits that we might choose. And then we'll look at some specific examples. The first type of flaw is that we could look at are personality-based, often emotional floors. These are traits like being controlling, arrogant, too flirtatious, or highly gullible. In general, most character flaws fit under this category. Most people have ways of behaving that are not right, whether they know it or not. Although most of the time I have to say that there's somewhat aware of it. Usually examples of this would include Harry Potter's arrogance as he grows older. You also can think of Toy Story's Woody needing to be the favorite toy. Or Jay Gatsby's obsession with Daisy. Under the example would be Scarlett O'Hara is willingness tease people and then cast them aside when she's done with them. In each of these examples, the floor describes a direct hindrance to the character in a way that affects the overarching plot directly. The next type of floor that you could have would be ideological or belief based floors. And ideology is a set of beliefs or ideals. Generally, they're often related to politics, the economy or society. A political ideology would be something like socialism or liberalism. A cultural or social ideology would be feminism, racism, anti-intellectualism. Now an etiology can be a flaw in a number of ways. One is when it negatively relates to the plot, or possibly when it is taken to an extreme. One thing to note, flawless do not necessarily have to be something that the reader is always the one who identifies. It can also be something that the characters identify in one another. For example, if your story is about two people who fall in love and one runs a large oil company while the other one leads an environmental organization. Then these two ideologies are flaws to either the characters are oil man will see this woman's pro Earth zest as a fall. And she will see his desire to drill oil as one as well. So in the case of this made-up story, if the plot is about their struggle to have a relationship than these ideals are getting in the way of that. And therefore, in that case, they're categorized as floors. Now, an ideology can also be seen as a flaw if the region zone, background and beliefs do not coincide with the characters. If, for example, a character is a Nazi in 1940s Germany, that character will be seen as flawed. When it comes to situations like this. As an author, you will need to do a lot of extra legwork to make this character relatable and sympathetic. If that's even an emotion you want your readers to have about it. This is because readers might feel very strongly about their opposing ideals. So strongly that nothing will overcome them and they will not connect with your character. So if your intent is to create a character who you really think that that character's ideologies are going to conflict with the readers. But she wants you to read it to connect to that character, you're really going to have to do a lot of extra legwork to make that happen. And ideology can also be taken as a fall. It's taken to an extreme. This is Sandra Bullock movie called two weeks notice. And that's an example of this in the film book portrays his zealous environmental lawyer whose energy for her cause keeps her from having well-rounded perspective as she might otherwise have. And therefore, the width plot is that because of that, she has a smaller life. That would be an example where ideologies taken too far. Other examples of ideological flaws would include things like Charles Dickens, Miss have a sham whose she's a total of man hater and this unwillingness to let go of the past really gets in her way. Harper Lee's character Bob Ewell and His deep-seated racism and Casa Blanca, Nazi Major Heinrich Strasser. All of these would fall under that category. Now none of these three examples are major characters. And you see that in their respective stories, only Miss have a sham actually changes from beginning to end. So a character, particularly as supporting one or an antagonist, may not change the floor. However, when it comes to stories that focus on ideological flaws in main characters, often the plot is dedicated to making that character better appreciate perspectives and circumstances of those he does not associate with. The next category of flaws that we can look at our behavioral flaws. Behavioral flaws or non personality-based traits, generally having to do with how they function in the world. They're generally maladaptive and impede the character in some way. These would include things like messiness or being illiterate or being clumsy. So these are lighter weight flaws that might very well make it into your story. But they're not linchpin flaws that the plot will center around. Mostly because these traits often sort of sit on this surface and don't require the character to undergo any kind of deeper psychological or ideological change. The meat, you could almost say that they're very close if not merge, distinguished for weaknesses. So an example of this would be Hermione's hyperfocus on her grades. And Harry Potter, That's not this tedious for she has to get over. But it is a weakness to her in some ways because it inhibits or friendships kinda makes her seem stuck up. So that's one way you could say it's kind of like a weakness, but it's also just a behavioral thing. If you find your character has a lot of behavioral flaws, that is a signal to check and see if you are actually using them as weaknesses. Remember, a flaw impedes a character from succeeding at our goal. 5. Choosing Strategic Flaws that Drive the Plot: Now, before you decide on which floor you want your character to have, it is important to remember that you are not just picking any floor. You need to have a strategic reason for the floor. You choose one of the mistakes that writers often make when assigning flaws and weaknesses to a character is that they think that if they just sort of a flaw onto the protagonist, then they can make her really great. And most other ways. In other words, they sort of treat flaws and weaknesses like a balancing act. You want to really smart, precocious protagonist. Fine, but let's just give her a short temper. This, however, is not a good plot focused way to develop a character. So we want to give our character strategic flaws. How do you choose the right ones? In all likelihood, your character will have more than one flaw. But generally, there is one floor that is the flaw, the main one that she will struggle with and need to overcome? It will be a personality defect of some kind as opposed to a defect she has no control over like a scar. As we mentioned earlier, this flaw in many cases, should one impede her in whatever it is she is trying to achieve a deal with. And to deepen her character, tell us more about her, make her more real. It needs to do those two things. Which means that if you want strategic, memorable characters, then you need to have a sense of your story and the internal journey your character is going on. How is she different from the store to the story and the end? What has she learned? How has she grown? You want to think about the emotional and psychological journey your character is going on. In all of the examples we have looked at thus far, the flaws characters possess not only get in the way of their best interests, but they also deepen our understanding of that character. What you will find is that this internal journey is directly related to the character's values and therefore her wants, needs, and goals. Which brings us to a critical question. You need to ask. What is the story you are trying to tell? Good plots generally have two sets of action and therefore change happening at the same time. These two lines of development intimately influence one another. There is what I'm going to call the surfaces story, which is what the characters are physically doing. Frodo is taking the ring to Mordor. Harry Potter is fighting against Voldemort. Jane Eyre is making her way in the world as a governess. But then there is the action, the development happening below the surface story. It is the understory, not in filmmaking. These terms are generally called the plot and the story. In literature, storing in something different. So don't get bogged down with terms. Just know that there is a main surface story, aka plot that is about the events happening that we're watching. And then there is the understory, that is what the events are really about. The understory drives the surface story. Let's look at an example in the film Casablanca. The surface story is that Rick is sort of a wants freedom fighter now nightclub owner was sort of renounced the cause and totally tried to bury his past, but his past resurfaces when his old loved walks back into his life having abruptly left hand. And what we're watching is sort of we follow Rick and this old love Elsa as they reconcile, rekindle the relationship, and then they're forced to eventually choose between each other and this freedom fighting cause Rick's flaws in that film or that he's cynical and selfish. He has his famous quote, eyes, I stick my neck out for nobody. But the understory is about a cynical man who learns to look out for others, more or less, rejoin society. The understory follows Rick for cynical man through his rekindled relationship with Elsa and eventually to becoming a Nazi fighter and someone who cares about the fate of others than himself. In most character focused stories, the understory is the one you are trying to tell. The surface story is how you get your protagonist from point a to point B of the understory. Do you see how the understory is connected to the protagonist's flaws? So that as we proceed through the action, rick amends his flaws and ends up with better person. The surface story is the avenue by which the understory comes to completion. If we had just randomly assigned flaws, could we have had the same story? Not really. You still could have had a surface story. But if you made, we're exploring is lazy. Then the reader's going to want to see how that laziness affects the story. What we do see is that he is selfish and to cynical. Those negative traits drive the conflict. So you need to think about your character flaws in relation to your story. 6. Beliefs Drive Flaws: Part One: When we consider that a novel or film has a surface plot and an understory. That understory is based on a change the character goes through. Then we need to examine that character's beliefs just as you cannot choose strategic traits until you understand the story you are trying to tell. So two, you cannot understand the story you are trying to tell until you get a handle on the character changes that are going to happen. And character change means a change in beliefs. Plot means change. If you are writing a character centric book. And that change will center on Go figure a character's internal change. And when we look at plots in which a character needs to change, what we find is that there is a flawed belief that must be corrected. If your character is going to improve in some way, then something needs to be lacking. Now, you could have perfectly great character who is poor, meets a handsome prince, marries him and now has loving security. Character change. Not really, but fun fairy tales. So do you read a character believed to change? But in general, you will find that novels often have characters with incorrect or a moral beliefs that are driving them to their fluid behavior. It is important to remember that the character's flawed actions are always based on a belief. A character believes certain things to be true, which makes her act a certain way. So when we are investigating what floors we want her to have, we must also ask the all important question. What does my character believed that makes her this way? For our purposes here, we're going to focus on fluid actions and beliefs. But this discussion of character beliefs extends to the character as a whole. When we look at why a character behaves a certain way. And it's helpful to consider the reason behind the floor and or belief behind the floor. Sometimes these two are intimately tied together. So let's look at each. The reason behind a flaw is often some kind of event-based occurrence in the character's past that makes him or her feel a certain way or believe a certain thing. Hence, how the flaw reason is tied to the underlying believe. Reasons could be an unfortunate past event. It could be that a character has been conditioned to behave a certain way. A parent who is very demanding, for example, might engender rebellious in his child. The belief behind it is, as mentioned, some kind of outlook or philosophy that a character either knowingly or unknowingly believes in, that drives him to act a certain way. You don't always have to give your underlying beliefs reason. A lot of people are unaware of why they feel certain ways and certainly you don't owe your readers all of that information. It can just be something that's helpful for you as a writer to know those things and brainstorm those things for yourself because it can just help you write your story and help you understand your character better. But more often than not, if you have a reason, it should have a belief that follows from it. Now you might be an absolute perfectionist to an unhealthy degree. And the reason for that might be that she never had a strong relationship with either of her parents. And she therefore turned into trying to control things that are alive and make things as totally impressive as possible. The underlying belief could be that she can make her life orderly enough. Her parents were finally appreciate her, or she could have an underlying belief that she is in control of her life because everything around her is just so when in reality what she has is no control because she's a slave to our perfectionism. Did you see how there she, she's believing? Okay. I believe that if everything's in order, my parents would love me. Right. So that's her belief. And the reason for that belief is because of how she was raised. Another example could be Dave, who was overly aggressive and dominating and is relationships and will not listen, respect the women. He is where, let's say in this case, we don't get a reason just to believe. We could say that today believes letting someone else be right means he no longer has power or he is weak. He believes that strength means being the one who is right, who makes the decisions, and who has the last word. His perception of what it means to be strong is awry. And you see how the belief drives the floor. His flaw is how badly he treats these women. But his belief why he treats them that way is because he believes something about himself and his own worth. The truth is that flows are often tied to our fears. In the cases we just cited. Marries a perfectionist because she fears lack of love. Dave is aggressive because he fears lack of power. So really take the time to investigate the flaws that you come up with and sort of go down this path. Okay. What's my flaw? Why does my character believe what he or she believes that makes them behave that way? And what's the reason that they even have that belief? Do you see a little train of ideas that you have to investigate? So if you're struggling to develop a character's beliefs, here are some questions you can ask to help your character become fleshed out. So one is, what misconception does your character have that makes him or her behave this way? What is he lacking mentally, emotionally, or spiritually as a result of this? Is that sort of interior lie that he's telling reflected in the character's actions and exterior worlds. Is the line making his life miserable when the story opens? And if so, how like, what is the condition of the character when the story begins? If he's not, he's okay, then will the inciting incident or first few plot points begin to make him realize that there is an issue. Very important thing to note. Beliefs do not have to be logical. They are just with the character beliefs. Do not feel like as a writer, everything you come up with has to have some sort of brilliant logic to it. It doesn't. People are logical all the time because very often we're driven by our emotions. And so we behaved in a logical ways. This is just human nature. So honestly, if you write a story where you have all these specific explicit answers and everything is so tight it can, it can get to a point where it almost doesn't feel real. So you want to be very careful about that. Now. Couldn't you just run a perfectionist woman or a domineering man Thrace novel without having a belief. Yes. But if you know the belief, that will probably change how you write the floor, if marriage just a perfectionist. You can show that in a lot of different ways without dealing with her relationship to her parents. But if this flaw is to do with her parents, now, you will likely bring that dynamic into your story. Because to overcome her perfectionism, she has to come to terms with her underlying belief. So, you know, you can say I have a flaw and there are all these different ways I can demonstrate it being manifested. You can't choose all of those. Because just like any story, you're choosing a few select scenes to tell you a story. This many things happened, but you can only tell me this many. So there are lots of ways you could shove her perfectionism. If the story you want to tell us about her relationship to her parents, you will bring that perfectionism in, in a way that relates to her parents into that relationship. In other words, really knowing underlying beliefs chooses the actual plot events that you show your readers. Most people do not change a habit or a bad behavior simply by forcing themselves not to do it. They change because they have a change of heart or perspective, which means to deal with a maladaptive behavior, we must deal with the problematic underlying issue. This problematic underlying issue is what drives the understory while the behavior it manifests is what we see on the surface story, which brings us back to strategic flaws that are related to the plot. If you connect your main thought to the main plot, then as the character proceeds through the surface events of your story, the underlying story happening below the surface is developing in tandem. 7. Beliefs Drive Flaws: Part Two: So in Jane Austen's Emma, Emma is a self-righteous, snobby, rather insensitive young woman who likes to have her own way. This surface action of the plot in that book is her attempt to get Harriet married. When her attempts result in a worse situation for Harriet, Emma realizes she's middleware. She ought not behaved cruelly and thus feels remorse. Lesson learned. Now, this is a total oversimplification of the story that has numerous in the plot strands. Read the book, it's great. But under the surface of this, Emma is a story about a young woman who must learn what it is to be charitable and kind. As well as learning that social status is not an indicator of worth. And that is a story about what makes a person worthy and how to treat them. The flaw is her insensitivity and her snobbishness. The belief is that people of a certain class or more worthy, and hence the right suitors for Harriet and the right people to associate. So as Anna proceeds through the story events, she learns the error of her ways. The floor ties to the belief which is the understory that drives events in this surface stray. I'm going to say that one more time. The floor that your character has ties to a belief that they have. And not belief is part of the understory that drives events in the surface story. The flaw manifests itself out in the surface story, but it's driven by this belief that is in the understory. Now, this does not mean that you have to necessarily show recent behind a character flaw. Sometimes you will want to, at the time snot. Sometimes keeping the past a mystery makes for more training reading. You really do not have to tell me every single thing about your character. Not only is it too much information and box a story down, but it really can be a little bit of Ms. Theresa, good thing mystery can be interesting, but it can be worth your while to at least think about why a character has certain flaws. In addition to making the character consistent and driving the plot. This awareness of the floor and the investigation you do has another benefit. Knowing the reason behind a flaw gives the reader a better opportunity to judge the character based on that floor. If we understand that you're very angry hero actually had an abusive childhood, we will not necessarily excuse the anger, but we might be more understanding of it. We see the hero as more three-dimensional. Now, you might not want your readers to sympathize with a character, in which case, don't do that, you know, leave the reason out and that's fine. But just providing that reason can again give us that three-dimensionality and just help us to connect with the character a bit more often like in life, right? I mean, somebody does something and you don't like it, or you're you're like, Whoa, I didn't like the way they treated me or something like that. But then you learn that she had a really bad day with a dog just died or something like that. And you sort of excuse the behavior, but it's the same idea. So if you have a character with these flowers, but you kinda give me some backstory or some reason that, that characters that way, I'll do the same thing. It's just another way to connect with the character on a more intimate level. Keep in mind that we're talking about main characters. Minor characters in particular don't necessarily need a reason. So don't feel like you have to give every single and your character, every single character in your story a four and a belief behind the flaw and a reason behind the Delete. Because you could just go nuts. You really don't need to do that. And truly again, there are a lot of books that don't give you any kind of detail like I'm talking about. And they're fabulous stories. So these are guidelines. These are not rules. They are guidelines. 8. Beliefs and Values: Make sure you keep in mind that a character's beliefs are tied to their values. Believes that certain people are more worthy. But she believes this because this is front of mind for her, because she values social status and money. She also values friendship and love. And unfortunately for her, she thinks that she's acting our friendship to force harried out of one relationship and into another. That's not good for her. But Emma wants Harriet to be happily married because she believes several things. She believes that she herself is a woman of means and social status. She believes she is a good friend, and that good friends help friends. She also believes marriage to the right man will make a woman happy. That the right man is somewhat of means and social status. That Harriet is her friend and is unmarried. And how it will therefore be happy when she is married to a man of means and social status. Therefore, as a woman of social status and is a friend to Harriet, she, Emma must help Harriet obtain a marriage to a man of means and social status. All of this is predicated on the values of friendship, marriage, money, and status. The value under good, the whole sequence of Emma's logic. However wrong it may be. Most people have a logical reason for the things that they do. Not. Logic is tied to values and beliefs. Now the above logical progression is not interesting. If it is true. It is only when there are issues that the reader starts to be engaged. So we need to take our character's values and beliefs and ask where they come in conflict with the story we are trying to tell. This. This is where we are able to prescribe a flaw intimately connects the character to the plot. Do you see how when we flesh out all of these things, it becomes apparent on its own. I mean, might have had other files. But her core flaw is her snobbishness. Because you values high society and considers herself a part of it. Secondary flaw is her sense that she knows best and can therefore make decisions for other people that they somehow can make for themselves. But in this situation, Emma's flaws will not be corrected until she changes both her values and her beliefs. She must learn that one, money and status are not everything. That's a value change to. She does not know best. That's a belief change. So do you see how there is both a value change and a belief change that needs to occur at the level of the understory. And when these things change, the flaws will be corrected. It isn't enough just for Emma to come to terms with the idea that money and status aren't everything. The other side of that has to be her belief that she isn't it certain position and she knows better if you just corrected the one and said, well, now she just she doesn't think that status and money on everything. But she's kept her belief that she can she knows best. You haven't fixed things. If you take away the belief that she knows best, but you leave the idea that status and money or everything, you haven't corrected everything, you need to correct both the value. And they believe. Now, how does this flaw tie in with wants and wants Harriet to marry a mad at me. She wants this because one, she thinks of herself as a good friend to, she thinks of herself as wealthy. And three, primarily, helping Harriet makes her feel good about herself. She looks down on Harriet and facilitating something she does not think Harriet could obtain on her own. Aka getting married to a good man, affirms in Emma's mind her own social status and Clyde Personality. Whatever needs is to learn that Harriet could be happily unmarried. She also needs to learn that wealth and status on not everything that Emma per cell needs to mind her own business. And finally, Emma has to learn that, hey, she's been a snob. Notice how we have external ones that are action driven. Marrying off Harriet, and we have internal ones feeling good about herself. Do you see how Emma's flaws are directly related to wants and her needs? What she wants is not correct. And she therefore exhibits improper beliefs and behavior. It cannot be corrected unless she receives what she needs, at which point the floor is erased or at least improved. Again, values and beliefs drive once. These things can manifest themselves in flaws that may and often do conflict with those needs. Okay. That's a lot. But there is one more step and considering flaws that we have to look at. 9. The Reasons Behind the Flaw: And that is that once we know a character flaw, the beliefs that floor is based on the story we're trying to tell. We are then finally ready to actually go back to the floor itself and flush it out. This is what will make it deep and plot forwarding. You want to give your character as much depth as possible. And that means not treating her flaws. And it's simplistic manner, since her bad behavior is based on her beliefs and values, then there are ways in which this flaw is working for. She would not continue to behave this way if she was not getting something out of it. And indeed, there may actually be positive aspects to that flaw. Which means we need to investigate the initial positive side of the floor and see what that is so that we can understand the benefit the character gets from it and why she might not even realize that it's a problem in the first place. It's cool. The way back to Casablanca. Rick is cynical and he's selfish. How does this work for him? Remember that Rick had his heartbroken by Ilsa? Rick believes that people, even those closest to you, who you think should treat you the best, ultimately behave selfishly. That's why he withdraws emotionally, just pulls away from the world. His negativity and his lack of willingness to help people benefits him in the following ways. One, he won't risk getting a broken heart again because he isn't opening his heart up to anyone. He is free to make business deals with people whose values like Nazis, he does not agree with because he's no longer siding with anyone at all. He thinks all people are selfish and he can therefore make considerable amounts of money off of every three because he has no personal ties of affection. More people trust him because they don't think he's siding with anyone. So they all tell him their secrets. And for he feels free in a way that you didn't before because he doesn't have personal emotional ties. These so-called positive results of his flaw are why he doesn't mind being in this way, even though others tell him the negative aspects of his personality, he's fine with it. He he has made this because this maladaptive behavior works for him. It serves him in these ways. And they also make the floor interesting and believable. If there's no upside to a flaw than the reader is not going to understand why it's there. There's no upside. The character is not invested in staying that way, nor does he have to struggle to change his ways. And we're not going to be leave a character that has this hideous, horrible behavior that has bad ramifications for his life. If we don't understand why the characters do not, like, we're just watching a character behave badly. We're going to sit there and go, why is he doing that? We need to see what the counter to thinks he's getting out of it in some way. The possible exception to this would be addiction in which the character feels totally trapped. The benefit, if you were going to say that there was one, you could say was the high with the escape provided by the drug, the alcohol, etc. But in general, addiction is the only thing that I can really think of where you might not actually have sort of an upside. Let's look at this again in the example of Emma, as we've said, Emma is snobby and she's proud. She believes that status and money matter. And then it is her duty to help other people because she has satisfied money. But these ill-advised behaviors in her benefit her because they want to make her feel good about herself, too. They affirm her perception of herself. Three, they make her look good to some people. And this case is interesting because her flaws are veiled under the veneer of Duke goodness. Others around her. They do seem they're trying to help Harriet. And they think well of her for it because they do not see the thoughts that are going on under the surface in our head. They don't perceive how Emma's kindness is really actually more about herself than about Harriet. And it's not until Emma has a rather public slip-up where her pride is actually on display, that she starts to rethink her behavior and her attitude. But she is, she is at heart a good person, which is why we like her as a reader. And it's why many of the characters around her make allowances for error. So that's kind of an interesting, I liked using that example for that. The reason it has to struggle against the upside of false perception of herself. She has to realize herself as far more fluid. And she knows. The lesson in all of this is that you really want to take time to think about your flaws, upside and how this manifests itself in your story. You want to always come back to the character's perception of things. Think about people in your own lives, who you really care about. And then think about the things that you love about that person and things you wish you could change about that person. What you will find is it very often the things we love about a person are probably deeply connected to the things that we don't necessarily love about them. We might have someone who we think is just too nit-picky and such a perfectionist, it kind of gets on our nerves. But at the same time, they keep the house so clean and we love that. I mean, there's most traits have a good and bad. And it's when you explore a trait in that kind of in-depth way that makes things interesting and more interesting and deeper and more nuanced. 10. Characters Without Flaws: One thing we need to address, what about stories with characters with no clearly identifiable flaws? Well, our discussion thus far has been about characters with identifiable flaws. It is important to remember that there are a lot of great books. Great books where the protagonist does not have a marked deficiency. He or she is struggling against. Novels like a little princess, Treasure Island, which are two books I love. Both of these are gripping, wonderful works. And in each of them, the protagonist does change. I'll be at varying levels. But the change that takes place is not one in which a flaw is slowly corrected through a series of events. In Little Princess Sara crew is this lady like in the end as she is in the beginning. Likewise, Jim Hawkins and Treasure Island, he demonstrates bravery from the start of the story all the way through. But while these characters don't have a strong flaw per se, they are still lacking something. There's something they gained by going through the experiences they go through. In the case of Sara. This is a little girl who has, up until she becomes impoverished, orphan, lived a very privileged life. Her challenge through the story is ten. She maintained her genteel behavior and are hopeful, generous personality when life is not going away. We therefore see her challenge to fight against adverse circumstances to retain her dignity and personality. Treasure Island is also coming of age story in which Jim, he becomes more independent young man who learns more and more to think for himself. And in general, he's a sort of Sarah but wiser character. But he does how personality deficiency that he's tried to repair either. Both of these are stories in which the protagonist lacks life experience. And all of this is to say that it could be that your story does not focus on an inner personality-based need that we just have to correct for the protagonist to achieve his or her goals. Some novels delve deeper into characters psyche than others, and that's okay. Many plot based as opposed to say, character centric books are this way. And it's just fine. If you plan on writing a plot that falls into this category, it will benefit you to consider with the lag is since there's no identifiable flaw. Again, it could be a lack of experience. It could be a lack of adversity and then having to practice good behavior you already had. But, but what is the lack? What is the deficiency? So some questions you can ask yourself about your character to determine a potential lack. Include things like, what does he learn? How to seek grow? How does she change? 11. Best Practices: Now that we've covered what flows are, why they matter, the kinds of flow is a character can add, and how to choose strategic plot focused flaws. Let's look at some best practices about incorporating them into your writing. First things first, remember that a character will not always see her flaws as a flaw. She may not even be aware of it at all. She might very well, if she is aware of it, have an excuse for being that way. We saw this in Casa Blanca. And as we said, this lack of awareness can often be part of what makes a story interesting. Really take time to consider. I mean, if your character is aware of the thought, is she trying to improve it, does it bother her? Is she contend with it being that way? I mean, we do this with people in our lives are like, Why don't you want to improve? We think that all the time. Think about that with your characters, you know, treat them like real people. Also along these lines. Characters who are always right or in fact always wrong tend to be pretty cardboard. So if your character's perceptions of herself are always in accord with reality, then you've really created a situation that has less conflict. This includes the level to which she's aware of her flaw and the impact of her flaw on other people. A character is 100% successfully assessed herself will not register as honest. I don't know anyone who has fully objective opinion about themselves. It's not possible. The way we see the world always colored by our desires, our background, our culture, etc. So I mean, your character should not totally, I mean, yes, no yourself. But your character is going to think certain things about herself that other people don't think that the characters don't think that the user doesn't think. I mean, I think everybody knows someone who said, well, a very thoughtful person and we're like, we don't know, I mean, we do that, we think that so let your characters, self-perceptions not always line up properly. It makes life very, very interesting. Also, why that is definitely interesting to consider contrasts between characters when assigning traits. Do be careful about absolutes. What I mean by that is like, unless you're going after a serious allegory, writing someone who is stereotypically and wholeheartedly cynical, for example. And then having another character in the story who is nothing but completely suite and trusting so that you can have this contrast that registers is false to the reader. If those are main characters, supporting characters are far more likely to seem somewhat underdeveloped. The obvious reason that you're not going to give them the same amount of attention on the page. But a stereotypical character should be a conscious choice. If the main character, it can be a fine choice. You just want to be aware that you're writing him or her that way and hopefully have a good reason for doing so. Also, make sure characters respond to each other's flaws realistically, part of what will bring a character to life is what happens around her, not just what she does. And if your character is overly sarcastic, for example, appreciate that as much. If we do not see how her sarcasm negatively affect her and the people she is around. Often a rider may focus on demonstrating that they're protagonists to say selfish. And then go about writing scenes in which says selfishness plays out, but then neglects to demonstrate the impact of that selfishness on the actual characters around her. What makes a character trait real is not just the actions of that character, it is also the responses to those actions. This is why it is important to develop the characters around two protagonists. Don't have every character respond to your protagonist the same way. Maybe her sister both stand for our selfishness and erupts when it happens. Maybe her mother ignores her selfishness, maybe her boyfriend is irritated. Just as the selfishness of your character will manifest itself in different ways. So too, will people's responses to it. Speaking of variety and nuance, give time to think about the ways the floor will manifest itself through your character. Throughout the story. You don't want to simply label a character's having a fall and then let the reader see it in action and dialogue. Give the reader a variety of situations. Which we can see the flaw enacted or appreciate the nuances of fat floor. We are selfish in different ways. We might be more selfish in one situation than another. We might be very selfish with our food, but not with our books. We might be selfish with some people and not with others. There are all kinds of ways that, that manifests itself as opposed to just being selfish across the board, which again makes your character cardboard. So you want nuance to play in what you're doing in all the ways you can think of it. When you do this, you will find often that the character should make mistakes because of these flaws. That these mistakes should have consequences. Otherwise she doesn't learn. So major flaws make varied flaws, but then make your character make mistakes based on those floors. And when you do this, it's really best if the consequences of those false or not fleeting. For example, maybe Sarah lies, and that's her phone. She lives today when she stole his spiral notebook. This history notes because she didn't take notes herself. And the test is coming up. She needed notes. So then she lost her teachers so that she doesn't have to take the test. But she doesn't get she gets overwhelmed, doesn't have time to read Dave's notes. So she then lies to the teacher so she doesn't have to take the test. She tells her teacher she's volunteering at the animal shelter. And so she can she make up the test next week. Then she goes home. She spent the afternoon alone napping instead of taking a test. But then Dave is killed, and no one's sure who did it. But his best friend mentioned a letter Dave received that seemed to upset him. And maybe he journaled about it in a spiral. And they should check that Sarah has his spiral and just seem flipping through it by Candace. When the police ask Sarah where she was at 230 on the 26th, she cannot say the shelter because she was at home. So no one can verify where she was. And she is obviously a liar who didn't go to the shelter and stolen notebook because everyone knows Dave wouldn't share it. And now Davis dead. You see how the flaw of being a liar has big consequences. And you would think she would say no more line. But well, she because she does have a habit of life and maybe she feels she needs to keep doing so to stay out of trouble. That she's actually not even important. In this situation, the floor takes on a life of its own and drives the plot forward and becomes so interesting and meeting. Again, that's what we've been saying in this whole course. Is that all this investigating the decisions that you make about your floor. Look at character's beliefs. Look at characters values, their wants, their needs. What's going on in the understory? What's going on in the ovary story? That's how you get something meaty like what we just talked about. That's how you get something where okay. She lied, but then she took a notebook and then she didn't use the notebook, but she went home. And now because she lied, does she keep lying? Does she not blind? She feels like she has to there's so much drama there because you've investigated the floor, because you've really put the floor at the center of the story. Finally, remember that while you may plan flaws in advance, especially if you're a discovery rider, more will reveal themselves as you write. So keep that openness. That's okay. The more you want to plan, plan. If you're more of a discovery writer and used to have a semblance of a floor. That's okay also because that can just kind of come out as you're actually writing. Having said that about flaws, let's look at some examples. 12. Literary Examples: Before we begin these analyses, just to note that the following contains plot spoilers. So this is necessary if we're going to assess these books. But if you haven't read either Sense and Sensibility or Madame Bovary and you want to, and you're worried about plot spoilers, you might skip this section of the course. So let's start with the first example. Marianne dash would Sense and Sensibility. Now Jane Austen's Marianne dashboard is one of those characters that is quite fleshed out and she goes through a very traditional character change that we've been discussing. There's a sense in which she's a bit of a caricature of an overly emotional female, especially a clone of a heroine, common too much of the fiction of Jane Austen's time. But she really does go through her own character development. When we look at her falls, we see someone firmly committed to our idea of what love looks like and how romantic relationships should be. She has no trouble telling others. Her sister, Eleanor, particular what she thinks even if it hurts them. And she's essentially a constant overflow of emotions. What is ironic is that it's then she who then falls for the shallow Willoughby, fostering a relationship that completely falls apart. It isn't until Willoughby deserts her that she then falls ill and cared for by those she previously disdained. That she then realizes her pettiness and it actually makes them more redeemed, redeemable, romantic choice. So let's break this down. Maryanne values love. She believes that love means an explosion of emotion. All this flowery language has passion. That's what she believes love looks like. She values love. She believes that it looks a certain way. She wants that kind of love for herself. She wants this emotional, passionate relationship. But what she needs is someone who actually will treat her well. And what treating her well, it looks like might not be what she was thinking. Her flaws that she's over emotional, shallow, and character. And to outspoken. Then we have to ask what is stored we're trying to tell. Austin is telling a story about the dangers of over sensitivity, which she saw is very prevalent in other novels of the time. These were books that privileged the emotions over any kind of rationalism. The surface story is Maryann and Eleanor, their sisters, each in a complicated life situation. They're trying to sort it out. The understory is the change that each of those needs to go through. Mary Ann's case. Going from being this sort of selfish girl who perceives love one way and it's very insensitive to other people's ideas of love. To someone who comports herself differently is more understanding of other people and has different expectations of love. Do you see how many ions flow in this situation is connected to the plot? Who Maryanne is, is intimately connected with the plot. So story, as well as Austin's underlying message. Senate, despite some of her unwise behavior, we do actually care about Maryann and we feel sincere resolution at the end based on our change of character. Let's look at one other example. Madame Bovary. Specifically Emma Bovary. Part of what makes examination of Emma Bovary. So interesting is that she is truly not that like even though we have access to many of her emotions and motivations, she is not written in a way that makes her relatable to the average reader. Although we might well be aware of some of the moral lessons the authors intimidating to us through Emma's story. We just, we just cannot seem to connect with her while she's chest kind of an ODS person. And forebear wrote in a very realistic style. If you just read the end of the novel to be faced with how unflinching that can be. He can write some really realistic descriptions of gruesome things. And so this is an example of a story where the main character is not necessarily the villain because she is absolutely taken advantage of by other people. We would consider less likable that she. But it is also straight away the challenges keeping the reader engaged and at least somewhat empathetic so that they finished the story and find it enjoyable. Part of the reason so bear gets away with having such an off-putting character as Emma, is to give her husband, Charles, a fair amount of page space as well. He is by no means the main character, but he is strikingly important and we get to know him, his past, his feelings quite well. So that the novel, while it is Emma's story, Emma's story in many ways, as it relates to Charles. Brief overview. Madame Bovary actually begins with Charles, which signals to us is important. We learn about his upbringing. He is considered not terribly bright and he becomes a doctor. And he's briefly married to a woman who unexpectedly dies. And he doesn't have much money. Well, he falls in love with Emma and the two marry, although she clearly does not love him. And she grows quickly bored with the marriage because it doesn't live up to aromatic x. Long story short. Due to a variety of events, she ends up having an affair and spending a tremendous amount of money to support a lavish lifestyle, eventually going into debt. All by the way, unbeknownst to Charles, eventually unable to pay all of this bag. She kills herself. I am totally leaving out a lot. But this is good enough for our purposes. In Emma's case, she values like Maryanne dash would. She's got this romantic ideal of love. And what that looks like. She also really does value beautiful things, expensive things. But her deep value, I mean, whatever really wants to be loved and admired, she values people admiring her and thinking very well of her belief is that if she owns all of these things, and if she has a certain kind of man, then she is a certain kind of woman. She wants to believe herself to be a certain kind of woman who is valued into doors. And she thinks that these other things will make her that she wants money, beautiful things and rich, handsome, wealthy, influential man to love her. What she needs is to realize that actually she hasn't really good men who does love her. And that there is no amount of wealth or beauty or affairs that will satisfy that these things are all sort of shadows that she's chasing after that don't have anything really solid to them. 13. Bringing it All Together: Alright, so we've said quite a lot about floors. It is worth our while to sort of recap so that we can go over everything that we've said. So let's go back over the main points of floss. A floor is a trait that is internal to the character that gets in her way and keeps her from achieving a goal. A weakness, on the other hand, is a vulnerability, but may not be bad in and of itself. Flaws and weaknesses make characters relatable and advance the plot. There are numerous kinds of forms, including personality, ideological, and behavioral. Remember to have a strategic reason for the floor you choose. Don't just add a flow, willy nilly, think about how it will impact the plot. To choose the best floor. Consider one that will impede her goals for the story and to develop her character and make her more rail. Also, determining the story you are trying to tell will help you choose an appropriate floor. Speaking to this, you want to consider the surface story and the understory. And you want to connect your floor to the understory. For a deeper plot focused narrative. Don't neglect the surface story though. Think about what flaws would be interesting to watch played out. Also remember that character flaws are based on values, beliefs, wants, and needs. A character believes certain things to be true, which makes her act a certain way. Also consider the upside of the floor. What does the character get out of behaving this way? And finally, that not all characters have an identifiable flaw. Some just have a lack of something. It could be money, power, the need to grow up. You can have a great story that does not have an identified character flaw. 14. Next Steps: So there you have it. Those are my bits of advice on writing flows into your characters to create strong connection with Ben between the characters and your readers, as well as making sure that that floor helps drive the plot forward. I hope this has been helpful for you. I do have a worksheet for you to help you flush out these things for yourself. You will find that the questions there go right in line with the things that we've talked about in this class. So I do hope you will take a look at it and follow along. There are also some class notes, just a brief outline to help you out. So I hope that helps as well. Deepest thanks to everyone who has reviewed my classes, offered kind words. I appreciate it so much. If you have not gone to my website and sign up for my mailing list, I would ask that you take a moment and do that because I am going to begin offering courses in a number of places. You will not be able to find anywhere else. But my website, signing up for that mailing list will allow you to get the news about those courses. I will be offering some special opportunities to students who do sign up for the mailing list. Please do that also, if you don't mind leaving a review, It's a huge help to me and I appreciate it a great deal. It also helps your appears in this community. I thank you so much for watching. And as always, I wish you the very best of luck with your writing.