If life passes me by
Like a wave I fail to ride
Oh what shame I’d have
What sorrow I’d feel
What pain I’d feel inside!
Life is an opportunity
A chance, and a possibility
It’s up to me to create my story
To live to the best my ability
And be sure this life was true for me
The creator lies within
I am alone, yet always with Him
If I choose to glide
Choose to ride the waves of life
Will I have the strength, the will, the dreams
The love and hope I need to survive
What dreams will I achieve
What passions will I grow
What struggles will I come to know?
Friday, May 27, 2011
When the Muses’ go on Vacation
Occasionally our creative juices go on vacation. Like us, they need to take a break and rejuvenate. Writers may call this writer’s block and other artists may call it something else. But I like to think about it as a time to fill those empty caverns of creativity with the kind of stuff that inspired us in the first place. If reading other writer’s works inspired us than perhaps this is a good time read a new book or re-read an old favorite. If just living life without the need to create is what inspired us than perhaps we need a vacation as well. I don’t believe we should force ourselves to the table to write. I don’t believe creativity can or should be forced. It should come naturally.
We should take advantage of our muses’ vacations to fill up on what intoxicated us in the first place – things I like filling up on include music, musicals, plays, films, books, art, history, lectures, hiking, biking, socializing. Then, after this hiatus, come back to our creative incubations and see if we can ignite that spark again, hopefully having been refueled. Allowing ourselves the freedom not to write, to put it all on hold for a while, may be just what we need. We should take note when our muses depart and begin planning our own vacation.
We should take advantage of our muses’ vacations to fill up on what intoxicated us in the first place – things I like filling up on include music, musicals, plays, films, books, art, history, lectures, hiking, biking, socializing. Then, after this hiatus, come back to our creative incubations and see if we can ignite that spark again, hopefully having been refueled. Allowing ourselves the freedom not to write, to put it all on hold for a while, may be just what we need. We should take note when our muses depart and begin planning our own vacation.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Touched By Many Lives
occasionally, in some romantic way, I'd like to say that I had one great teacher, one mentor who showed me the secrets of expressing myself and sharing my ideas, but I can't. No one person was my teacher. No one person showed me my gifts. My teachers came in many forms - school teachers, family members, friends, and those whom I may never meet, yet who nonetheless have touched me. Perhaps I didn't need a single teacher, like so often happens to artists in stories and films. Perhaps I never allowed myself such a teacher. Perhaps I never leaped at the opportunity. Sometimes I wish I had a storybook tale to tell of how I found my love of writing, some person other than myself, a master, whom I could credit with my inspiration. But I can think of no one. For me, teachers have appeared in many forms and through many different people. And you know what, that's just fine with me, being touched by many lives.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Seduced by the Muse
I fell in love with the world of books, not because I wanted to be smarter than others, nor because I wanted to conquer the great halls of literature, but because the muse of literature herself lured me in, seduced my imagination, and showed me a forgotten part of myself.
I’m twenty-seven years old right now; and I didn’t read for the first twenty-three years of my life. That’s my confession. It’s not that I couldn’t read, just like I didn’t do well in school not because I wasn’t capable of doing well. I didn’t read because I didn’t see why I should; I didn’t have a reason or desire to. Yes, of course, I did know books as a young child, even occasionally read one – I remember reading a few of “The Boxcar Children,” several of the “Goosebumps,” and one particular children’s story called, “A Castle in the Attic,” which had a profound and lasting impact on me. But all these were mere remedies to childhood boredom, or acts of behaving properly in front of adults, or following an accepted social/cultural norm. Truthfully, I would have much rather been outside playing, or inside playing, in fact, anywhere playing if the choice was up to me.
I remember playing with my action figures, or those little plastic soldiers and cowboys-n-Indians you find (well at least you used to find) in the super market. When I had no Lego’s, no action figures (GI Joes, etc), and no plastic super market figures I improvised. I would turn things, random objects and such, into the figures I wanted to use in my plots and scenes. Sticks, leaves, bark, rocks, grass, household figurines, Christmas decorations, chess pieces, even a stack of playing cards could act as a great substitute for a vast army (The ranks are already drawn out for you!) These dramas would be enacted with complete casts – royalty, aristocracy, peasants, military, rebels, tribes, even wizards witches and the like – and the dramas were unpredictable and varied greatly. Sometimes I would reenact a movie or show I’d recently watched, other times I would just wing it, coming up with my own plots. That’s what I did to entertain myself as child. I’m even a little embarrassed though not ashamed to say that this hobby continued on until around the fourth or fifth grade, a time I remember when it was no longer cool or ‘normal’ to still be playing with action figures, and especially playing army with a deck of cards – If ever that was even normal! I would sweep away my armies, like Zeus in “The Iliad” if I became alerted to someone barging in on my play world – my brother, my sisters, anyone. I suppose any of us who can remember being a child playing silly games can relate with that. I was shy and embarrassed about this kind of hobby, yes, but I was also satisfying a part of myself that needed some form of expression, that needed to be recognized.
That is what I mean when I say I would have rather been playing than reading books as a child. And if I was not in the midsts of one of these fantasies, I would be acting out similar ones with my friends. Not that I had much else to do, as we were very poor, and I often needed to escape from the dysfunctional home I lived in. My father was an abusive drug attic, dealer, and alcoholic. My brother and two sisters often sided with one another, leaving me feeling indifferent and outcast; we fought a lot. My mother was busy, young, overwhelmed, helpless, and poor; but she was also loving, accepting, wonderful, and always there for me no matter what. She is an incredible person and mother. (Despite this early conflict, my family and I are on excellent terms today, though my father has long not been in the picture.)
Like most children eventually do, I grew out of those childhood fantasies. I was a catcher in baseball for over a decade. I was a linebacker in football. Throughout my youth I got into a lot of trouble in and out of school, and was in general (or more accurately in image) a tough guy. Sort of like the heroes of my childhood fantasies, I always found my way into conflicts and fought my way through them. I became burnt out with life fairly early on. I’d say I was spiritually burnt out by sixteen not having anything in life that intrigued me; and mentally burnt out by twenty and physically burnt out by twenty-three. And that’s when I perhaps began to listen to that child within me once again. Perhaps that’s when the muse of literature, whom upon reflection seems to have watched over me in my childhood, once again came to watch over me. For the most part I withdrew from the life I had created in my first twenty-three years. I became pretty reclusive, depressed, well absorbed in my guitar playing, fairly antisocial, and I was ambitious to get back into school – to do something positive and productive with my life.
The muse lured my in via my mother’s book shelf. Occasionally I’d glance through it, but on one occasion, I picked up a book that changed my life, “The Hobbit.” This story captured my imagination, fulfilled some forgotten longing I had, and gave me a breath of fresh air in a life I had been suffocating in. It only took me a couple days to finish the book, but its affect had been unleashed in me. I’m not really sure what happened to me during this time of my life. Perhaps some lost or forgotten part in me had awoken or re-awoken; maybe I was taken away from my turbulent life for awhile, as though I fell into Middle Earth and found that for a time the problems of my life seized to exist. Whatever it was, I can never be wholly certain what the actual impact reading this story had on me. But at that point, I began to realize that there was much more to life than what I’d known and experienced so far – sort of like Bilbo Baggins did.
Within two weeks I had finished both the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings. With the assurance that I could actually read and set myself to something and see it through till the end, did wonders for my low self-esteem. I moved on to other fantasy books and the enchantment continued. Tad Williams, Julian May, and a few other’s works found their way into my imagination. Apart from Tolkien’s epic saga, one other author had an epiphany-like impact on me: Christopher Paolini’s, “Inheritance Cycle” – the most popular book being Eragon, named after one of the last dragon rider’s in Alagaesia, Paolini’s fantasy world. It wasn't the greatness of his story, or his writing that had such a profound impact on me. It was the fact that he was only nineteen years old when it was published! I was reading a book that was published by someone five years younger than me. This struck me right in the heart; if he could do something that great at that age I could definitely do something great too!
Though it would still take me a couple years to find out that I really was a writer, the seed was planted, and I was inspired to do something with my life. I got into school shortly after reading Eragon. Determination can take you a long way when other things fail you; I was determined to find out what I wanted to do in school, in life.
Being a pretty good musician and comfortable playing for others, I began college enthusiastic about following a musical path. Had I played any instrument other than the guitar I might have found a place in the school’s orchestra. But the academic musical culture being what it is, the guitar is somewhat in its own category. Most instruments in the field follow musical notation – this allows everyone to know what the musical notes are, what the time signature of the piece is, and, in general, the who what where and when of how it’s all meant to be played. Guitarist read tabs, a different kind of musical notation, unique to the guitar, but nonetheless does all the same kind of stuff. This fact alone does not alienate the guitar from the rest of the instruments, there are other factors too – like the guitar not being a part of the classical music world through much of classical music’s history, and thus it was not included in the scores written by the early composers. In short, the landscapes of the academic and professional classical music worlds are kind of already set against guitar players, especially self-taught players life myself who learned by memorizing classic and alternative rock songs like the Beatles and Tom Petty. This still did not deter me; I was determined to mastering my instrument.
As I continued on in other classes, however, having to write essays and others assignments, I began to get in touch with my writing voice. I had no clue that I could write, and definitely never allowed myself the possibility of actually becoming a writer. I began college with around a high school sophomore level of reading and writing, so I had some catch-up classes to complete before I could move on to college level classes. I took the same teacher for all of these English classes. She was a young professor, very kind, very empathetic, and great at connecting with students. Her feedback and encouragement helped me to appreciate my ability to write and inspired me to want to write more. After two years of taking her classes I had switched from pursuing a musical career to a writing one. I knew then that writing was what I wanted to do.
In the last few years I’ve expanded in my writing and am currently working on my first novel, Sparrow Ridge. It has evolved from a short story, written for a fiction writing class. I’m three quarters of the way done with it and it will likely undergo one final revision before I send it off to be published next summer. Like when I was younger making my actions figures perform and creating imagined civilizations out of playing cards, I still have a need to express this part of me that loves to create dramas - that writer has always lived within me.
I’m twenty-seven years old right now; and I didn’t read for the first twenty-three years of my life. That’s my confession. It’s not that I couldn’t read, just like I didn’t do well in school not because I wasn’t capable of doing well. I didn’t read because I didn’t see why I should; I didn’t have a reason or desire to. Yes, of course, I did know books as a young child, even occasionally read one – I remember reading a few of “The Boxcar Children,” several of the “Goosebumps,” and one particular children’s story called, “A Castle in the Attic,” which had a profound and lasting impact on me. But all these were mere remedies to childhood boredom, or acts of behaving properly in front of adults, or following an accepted social/cultural norm. Truthfully, I would have much rather been outside playing, or inside playing, in fact, anywhere playing if the choice was up to me.
I remember playing with my action figures, or those little plastic soldiers and cowboys-n-Indians you find (well at least you used to find) in the super market. When I had no Lego’s, no action figures (GI Joes, etc), and no plastic super market figures I improvised. I would turn things, random objects and such, into the figures I wanted to use in my plots and scenes. Sticks, leaves, bark, rocks, grass, household figurines, Christmas decorations, chess pieces, even a stack of playing cards could act as a great substitute for a vast army (The ranks are already drawn out for you!) These dramas would be enacted with complete casts – royalty, aristocracy, peasants, military, rebels, tribes, even wizards witches and the like – and the dramas were unpredictable and varied greatly. Sometimes I would reenact a movie or show I’d recently watched, other times I would just wing it, coming up with my own plots. That’s what I did to entertain myself as child. I’m even a little embarrassed though not ashamed to say that this hobby continued on until around the fourth or fifth grade, a time I remember when it was no longer cool or ‘normal’ to still be playing with action figures, and especially playing army with a deck of cards – If ever that was even normal! I would sweep away my armies, like Zeus in “The Iliad” if I became alerted to someone barging in on my play world – my brother, my sisters, anyone. I suppose any of us who can remember being a child playing silly games can relate with that. I was shy and embarrassed about this kind of hobby, yes, but I was also satisfying a part of myself that needed some form of expression, that needed to be recognized.
That is what I mean when I say I would have rather been playing than reading books as a child. And if I was not in the midsts of one of these fantasies, I would be acting out similar ones with my friends. Not that I had much else to do, as we were very poor, and I often needed to escape from the dysfunctional home I lived in. My father was an abusive drug attic, dealer, and alcoholic. My brother and two sisters often sided with one another, leaving me feeling indifferent and outcast; we fought a lot. My mother was busy, young, overwhelmed, helpless, and poor; but she was also loving, accepting, wonderful, and always there for me no matter what. She is an incredible person and mother. (Despite this early conflict, my family and I are on excellent terms today, though my father has long not been in the picture.)
Like most children eventually do, I grew out of those childhood fantasies. I was a catcher in baseball for over a decade. I was a linebacker in football. Throughout my youth I got into a lot of trouble in and out of school, and was in general (or more accurately in image) a tough guy. Sort of like the heroes of my childhood fantasies, I always found my way into conflicts and fought my way through them. I became burnt out with life fairly early on. I’d say I was spiritually burnt out by sixteen not having anything in life that intrigued me; and mentally burnt out by twenty and physically burnt out by twenty-three. And that’s when I perhaps began to listen to that child within me once again. Perhaps that’s when the muse of literature, whom upon reflection seems to have watched over me in my childhood, once again came to watch over me. For the most part I withdrew from the life I had created in my first twenty-three years. I became pretty reclusive, depressed, well absorbed in my guitar playing, fairly antisocial, and I was ambitious to get back into school – to do something positive and productive with my life.
The muse lured my in via my mother’s book shelf. Occasionally I’d glance through it, but on one occasion, I picked up a book that changed my life, “The Hobbit.” This story captured my imagination, fulfilled some forgotten longing I had, and gave me a breath of fresh air in a life I had been suffocating in. It only took me a couple days to finish the book, but its affect had been unleashed in me. I’m not really sure what happened to me during this time of my life. Perhaps some lost or forgotten part in me had awoken or re-awoken; maybe I was taken away from my turbulent life for awhile, as though I fell into Middle Earth and found that for a time the problems of my life seized to exist. Whatever it was, I can never be wholly certain what the actual impact reading this story had on me. But at that point, I began to realize that there was much more to life than what I’d known and experienced so far – sort of like Bilbo Baggins did.
Within two weeks I had finished both the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings. With the assurance that I could actually read and set myself to something and see it through till the end, did wonders for my low self-esteem. I moved on to other fantasy books and the enchantment continued. Tad Williams, Julian May, and a few other’s works found their way into my imagination. Apart from Tolkien’s epic saga, one other author had an epiphany-like impact on me: Christopher Paolini’s, “Inheritance Cycle” – the most popular book being Eragon, named after one of the last dragon rider’s in Alagaesia, Paolini’s fantasy world. It wasn't the greatness of his story, or his writing that had such a profound impact on me. It was the fact that he was only nineteen years old when it was published! I was reading a book that was published by someone five years younger than me. This struck me right in the heart; if he could do something that great at that age I could definitely do something great too!
Though it would still take me a couple years to find out that I really was a writer, the seed was planted, and I was inspired to do something with my life. I got into school shortly after reading Eragon. Determination can take you a long way when other things fail you; I was determined to find out what I wanted to do in school, in life.
Being a pretty good musician and comfortable playing for others, I began college enthusiastic about following a musical path. Had I played any instrument other than the guitar I might have found a place in the school’s orchestra. But the academic musical culture being what it is, the guitar is somewhat in its own category. Most instruments in the field follow musical notation – this allows everyone to know what the musical notes are, what the time signature of the piece is, and, in general, the who what where and when of how it’s all meant to be played. Guitarist read tabs, a different kind of musical notation, unique to the guitar, but nonetheless does all the same kind of stuff. This fact alone does not alienate the guitar from the rest of the instruments, there are other factors too – like the guitar not being a part of the classical music world through much of classical music’s history, and thus it was not included in the scores written by the early composers. In short, the landscapes of the academic and professional classical music worlds are kind of already set against guitar players, especially self-taught players life myself who learned by memorizing classic and alternative rock songs like the Beatles and Tom Petty. This still did not deter me; I was determined to mastering my instrument.
As I continued on in other classes, however, having to write essays and others assignments, I began to get in touch with my writing voice. I had no clue that I could write, and definitely never allowed myself the possibility of actually becoming a writer. I began college with around a high school sophomore level of reading and writing, so I had some catch-up classes to complete before I could move on to college level classes. I took the same teacher for all of these English classes. She was a young professor, very kind, very empathetic, and great at connecting with students. Her feedback and encouragement helped me to appreciate my ability to write and inspired me to want to write more. After two years of taking her classes I had switched from pursuing a musical career to a writing one. I knew then that writing was what I wanted to do.
In the last few years I’ve expanded in my writing and am currently working on my first novel, Sparrow Ridge. It has evolved from a short story, written for a fiction writing class. I’m three quarters of the way done with it and it will likely undergo one final revision before I send it off to be published next summer. Like when I was younger making my actions figures perform and creating imagined civilizations out of playing cards, I still have a need to express this part of me that loves to create dramas - that writer has always lived within me.
Friday, August 20, 2010
As I Dream
As long as I dream
Life never seizes to enchant me
Rays of light shine through clouds of dark
Storms come and go
And life continues its great show
As long as I dream
Never will time ravage me
Rains wash away leaving flora new each day
Flowers open and close
And life continues its great show
As long as I dream
No hope is lost to me
Winter snows melt away from all they kept at bay
Muses laugh and dance and sing with trees
While I pursue these dreams in me
Life never seizes to enchant me
Rays of light shine through clouds of dark
Storms come and go
And life continues its great show
As long as I dream
Never will time ravage me
Rains wash away leaving flora new each day
Flowers open and close
And life continues its great show
As long as I dream
No hope is lost to me
Winter snows melt away from all they kept at bay
Muses laugh and dance and sing with trees
While I pursue these dreams in me
Thursday, August 5, 2010
The Obstacle Course of Life
What is more important: How we overcome obstacles? Or, that we overcome obstacles?
The latter seems definitely important, for without overcoming the obstacles in our way we could not continue on with our lives for long. Indeed, one of the earliest obstacles we face is that of birth. Then comes the obstacles of nourishment, love, shelter, and safety. In order to live we must struggle sometimes. Overcoming these struggles is a great deal of what life is all about; and what stories are all about.
However, in the outcome of some obstacles it is not so much important that we succeeded as it is that we tried our best. A fantastic creative writing teacher of mine used a simple aphorism to express this notion: "If I failed, did I try my best?" Makes you think, huh?
For example, I think we can all agree that starting a story and failing to either finish it or get it published is not necessarily a failure. Yes, we may have failed in completing the task we set out for and we may have failed in our ultimate goal of sharing our writing with the world, but if we gave it our best, really tried, and, thus, likely learned a great deal, than these failures pale in comparison to what we probably achieved – whether we consciously feel we achieved anything or not.
The stories of literature and of life are full of such examples. Atticus Finch failed to save Boo Radley’s life, but we know he tried his best; and though we may feel saddened, we also may feel strangely uplifted. Martin Luther King Jr. failed to end segregation and racial injustice in America, but we know he died trying; and though we may feel sad even outraged, we may also feel a great sense of admiration and inspiration. On and on through history and in the present we can recall and find stories of struggles fought but never won; and we can see in those stories that overcoming the struggle was not ultimately nor historically what was important, what was was that the struggle was courageously undertaken.
Overcoming obstacles is wonderful and worthy of pride and admiration. But these achievements last only so long before the waves of change, of life, bring new obstacles to overcome. Though the more experienced will be better suited to face further obstacles than those not so, this does not mean they are invulnerable to the struggles of life. As long as we are human, our health is threatened, our loved ones are at risk, and that we will have a home tomorrow is never certain. Our lives are what are constantly at stake in life. Yet we are evolved enough, at least many of us are, to accept this reality with a certain serenity and grace, a shared dignity to the extent that we don’t constantly act like wild beats who are always fighting for our lives – even though we are.
Nature designed us to face the obstacle course of life, and usually even rewards us when we succeed. How we proceed – whether we try our best and fail or barely try yet still prevail – is what colors and shapes the fabric of our lives; that the fabric merely exists is not as important to us as how it is designed. The struggles faced by the characters in stories and in history are the enactments of the struggles we all still face today. How they proceeded is what makes their stories great or not. The color or shape of these many struggles may change with the times, but the fabric, the reality that the obstacle course exists, always remains.
So what is more important: That we overcome obstacles? Or how we overcome obstacles? Perhaps neither is more important. Perhaps what is important is that, like the characters of the stories we love and write, we courageously face the obstacles life places in our way, that we learn and grow through them to be better suited to face more challenges, that if we fall down we struggle to get back up or help another to get back up. But perhaps what is the most important is that we try, that we try our best to continue to tread through the obstacles of life.
The latter seems definitely important, for without overcoming the obstacles in our way we could not continue on with our lives for long. Indeed, one of the earliest obstacles we face is that of birth. Then comes the obstacles of nourishment, love, shelter, and safety. In order to live we must struggle sometimes. Overcoming these struggles is a great deal of what life is all about; and what stories are all about.
However, in the outcome of some obstacles it is not so much important that we succeeded as it is that we tried our best. A fantastic creative writing teacher of mine used a simple aphorism to express this notion: "If I failed, did I try my best?" Makes you think, huh?
For example, I think we can all agree that starting a story and failing to either finish it or get it published is not necessarily a failure. Yes, we may have failed in completing the task we set out for and we may have failed in our ultimate goal of sharing our writing with the world, but if we gave it our best, really tried, and, thus, likely learned a great deal, than these failures pale in comparison to what we probably achieved – whether we consciously feel we achieved anything or not.
The stories of literature and of life are full of such examples. Atticus Finch failed to save Boo Radley’s life, but we know he tried his best; and though we may feel saddened, we also may feel strangely uplifted. Martin Luther King Jr. failed to end segregation and racial injustice in America, but we know he died trying; and though we may feel sad even outraged, we may also feel a great sense of admiration and inspiration. On and on through history and in the present we can recall and find stories of struggles fought but never won; and we can see in those stories that overcoming the struggle was not ultimately nor historically what was important, what was was that the struggle was courageously undertaken.
Overcoming obstacles is wonderful and worthy of pride and admiration. But these achievements last only so long before the waves of change, of life, bring new obstacles to overcome. Though the more experienced will be better suited to face further obstacles than those not so, this does not mean they are invulnerable to the struggles of life. As long as we are human, our health is threatened, our loved ones are at risk, and that we will have a home tomorrow is never certain. Our lives are what are constantly at stake in life. Yet we are evolved enough, at least many of us are, to accept this reality with a certain serenity and grace, a shared dignity to the extent that we don’t constantly act like wild beats who are always fighting for our lives – even though we are.
Nature designed us to face the obstacle course of life, and usually even rewards us when we succeed. How we proceed – whether we try our best and fail or barely try yet still prevail – is what colors and shapes the fabric of our lives; that the fabric merely exists is not as important to us as how it is designed. The struggles faced by the characters in stories and in history are the enactments of the struggles we all still face today. How they proceeded is what makes their stories great or not. The color or shape of these many struggles may change with the times, but the fabric, the reality that the obstacle course exists, always remains.
So what is more important: That we overcome obstacles? Or how we overcome obstacles? Perhaps neither is more important. Perhaps what is important is that, like the characters of the stories we love and write, we courageously face the obstacles life places in our way, that we learn and grow through them to be better suited to face more challenges, that if we fall down we struggle to get back up or help another to get back up. But perhaps what is the most important is that we try, that we try our best to continue to tread through the obstacles of life.
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Learning Life’s Lessons through Characters
What do all (at least most) stories need to have to be ‘good’?
Well, one answer could be conflict. Our stories need conflict because that’s how our characters show who they really are, and that’s how our story moves towards its ending. Unlike life, where conflicts never completely seize to exist, the conflicts in our stories need a strong enough sense of resolution that we can call it ‘the end’. Is this not one major reason why we enjoy stories so much – that we can experience a sense of resolution that is usually beyond our reach in real life?
What characters are the ones we love the best? Are they the ones that we feel did the right thing when others would not? Are they the ones that are the most ‘like us’ or the ‘us’ we want to be? Are they the ones who remind of someone we love?
Obviously, we all have different favorite characters, but we each see something in that character that is meaningful to us. The characters I really loved, like Atticus Finch, Frodo Baggins, and Harry Potter – to name a few – represented much more to me than simple fiction characters; sometime in the course of reading their story, we (the character and I) became intertwined with each other:
Frodo’s daunting struggle to destroy the One Ring grew into my desire to see it destroyed; Harry Potter’s terrorizing struggle to defeat Lord Voldamort grew into my desire to see him defeated; Atticus Finch’s struggle to stand up for social justice grew into my desire to see it prevail.
Story characters can become role models, teachers, and companions for us; they can go places, do things, and face things that perhaps we’d be too afraid to do ourselves, and they can share that wisdom with us through their story. Through facing tough challenges, making difficult decisions, or learning how to stand for something, these characters represent important elements of the human struggle. By eavesdropping on their challenges, these characters can show us how to better face our own. Life’s lessons, though in large part can only be learned through experience, can also be understood in part through others experiences.
The songs of life sing just as true in fiction as they do in life for you.
Well, one answer could be conflict. Our stories need conflict because that’s how our characters show who they really are, and that’s how our story moves towards its ending. Unlike life, where conflicts never completely seize to exist, the conflicts in our stories need a strong enough sense of resolution that we can call it ‘the end’. Is this not one major reason why we enjoy stories so much – that we can experience a sense of resolution that is usually beyond our reach in real life?
What characters are the ones we love the best? Are they the ones that we feel did the right thing when others would not? Are they the ones that are the most ‘like us’ or the ‘us’ we want to be? Are they the ones who remind of someone we love?
Obviously, we all have different favorite characters, but we each see something in that character that is meaningful to us. The characters I really loved, like Atticus Finch, Frodo Baggins, and Harry Potter – to name a few – represented much more to me than simple fiction characters; sometime in the course of reading their story, we (the character and I) became intertwined with each other:
Frodo’s daunting struggle to destroy the One Ring grew into my desire to see it destroyed; Harry Potter’s terrorizing struggle to defeat Lord Voldamort grew into my desire to see him defeated; Atticus Finch’s struggle to stand up for social justice grew into my desire to see it prevail.
Story characters can become role models, teachers, and companions for us; they can go places, do things, and face things that perhaps we’d be too afraid to do ourselves, and they can share that wisdom with us through their story. Through facing tough challenges, making difficult decisions, or learning how to stand for something, these characters represent important elements of the human struggle. By eavesdropping on their challenges, these characters can show us how to better face our own. Life’s lessons, though in large part can only be learned through experience, can also be understood in part through others experiences.
The songs of life sing just as true in fiction as they do in life for you.
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