was talking to some folks about character motivations & want vs need and i explained the idea that a lot of compelling characters have a kind of ghost -- a thing that haunts them, that drives them -- so i want to talk about that here, and how it actually helps me plot my stories.

forever disclaimer there is no one way to write and i am just talking my ass so if this doesn't click with you just ignore me lol

so -- ghosts. everyone on earth has things about their past that inform the way they live their lives, for better or worse. imo, for a character arc to hit true, we need to see the ripple effects of Who The Character Was, and how it conflicts with Who They Need To Be

my favorite example of this, of course, is from ATLA.

one of the most compelling things about ATLA is that aang and zuko both have two incredibly compelling ghosts -- aang is haunted by the fact that he ran away and the air nation was wiped out, zuko is haunted by the fact that his father dishonored him and his mother is missing

while neither of these things are directly their fault, the characters believe they are -- and it has consequences, for every one of their actions, up until the very end.

and for us, as the audience, this works really, really well, bc we feel it. we know they need to move on.

where ghosts are interesting, then, is when we see them impact the character's as they move through the narrative. we end up frustrated or excited or outraged on the behalf of these characters bc we can so clearly /see/ how this ghost is driving them

even people who don't like aang want to be like, aang, bro, you were /twelve/, it's /okay/. but aang's incredible grief -- his reluctance to take on this role, and then later on, the seriousness with how much he consider it's impact on the world, is made stronger bc of his past

and then zuko -- god, zuko. we see what haunts him isn't his fault. we see and understand how it drives him. we scream at him when he betrays uncle and weep when he finally makes the right choice. & this is strengthened bc we have watched this ghost haunt this poor kid for YEARS

ghosts appeal to us bc they follow us in our lives, too, and so to see characters in fiction work through that, to see them struggle and triumph humanizes them.....even when they can like, shoot lightning out of their hands, or w/e

where i use this in plotting, then, is i try to understand what would force my mc to confront this -- and be challenged by it. when i build a plot, i try to ask "what does this character need? what do they want?" and my plots get richer when i also ask "what are they haunted by?"

this could be anything. it could be as big as abandoning your people to become sitting ducks for the fire nation-- or as small as breaking up w someone & knowing years later, you made a mistake. that person would have been right for you. but you weren't ready, & now they're gone.

i think seeing /what/ haunts a person is so interesting bc it tells us an incredible amount about the kind of individual they are. people are going to be haunted by different things, and how they handle that, and how it informs their choices & relationships can be v compelling

so when i write, i try to make a plot that will draw this out of mc, for better or worse. bc i think seeing real life bump up against a character's uglier interior is always going to be something that humanizes even v Powerful characters (think kaz, being haunted by his brother)

anyways. this is just something that is v helpful to me. and for the stories i write they usually feel....incomplete, until i have that mc's ghost figured out.

hopefully this is helpful!!! if not that's fine too!!! just ignore me no one knows anything writing isn't real!!!