Trying to do a writeblr?

We’ve all been there. You’re breezing through a draft and all of a sudden a character does something or says something that they really shouldn’t, or maybe they’ve taken on an entirely new personality from when you were writing them yesterday.

Whatever the case, it’s frustrating as hell. So, how are we, the writers, supposed to handle this?

The first thing you need to do is stop writing and take a hard look at what happened. I know that this is often difficult for us to hear and come to terms with, but our characters really don’t just do whatever they feel like - we’ve crafted them and built a story around them (or built them for a story), which means that we are 100% fully in control of them. When your character does something unexpected that’s still in character, then that means that you’ve built them up to a place where writing them is subconscious (yay!). However, when your character does something unexpected that’s entirely ooc, that means that you took a misstep somewhere. But that’s okay! These things are perfectly fixable.

Scenario 1: A side character has a sudden and complete personality switch in a scene (ex. your MC’s love interest suddenly went from being indifferent and full of snark to being incredibly tender and sympathetic to your weeping MC). 

What happened: Probably one of two things (though maybe both). You either gave the scene to the wrong character, or you haven’t built up the Love Interest enough to allow for this sudden soft side. 

How to fix it, part 1: Rewrite - just a little. If you gave the scene to the wrong character, it’s easy to switch out. Maybe that fits in the same spot, or maybe it doesn’t. If MC is alone with character A when they start crying, but they really need to be alone with character B (who will comfort them and still be in character), then the crying scene should move places in the draft and be replaced with some different form of dialogue between MC and character A. Or, maybe (no one wants to hear this, sorry), you need to cut the scene entirely. MC is allowed to cry by themself, or maybe MC doesn’t need to cry on-page at all. Cutting the scene is always an option, though no one likes to kill their darlings. 

How to fix it, part 2: Rewrite - a bit more. If this is going to be a groundbreaking moment™ between MC and Love Interest, but Love Interest showing this kind of softness seems uncharacteristic and out of place, then you’ve missed some character building within the draft itself. Maybe this scene makes sense in your head - you know that Love Interest has a soft side, but clearly the draft is looking at you like “no???? Love Interest is rude™” or you wouldn’t be having an issue. So to solve this problem, you’re going to have to add in instances of foreshadowing prior to the scene. Maybe Love Interest has a younger sibling and MC sees them being nice to them. Whatever you decide on, just make it so that an average reader will be able to see this coming (also imo for this exact situation, don’t let Love Interest immediately be tender to MC. it’ll feel more natural to the reader if Love Interest doesn’t want to be vulnerable right away but slowly softens as MC keeps crying).

Scenario 2: You change an aspect of the plot (at any point in the drafting process) and your character (or multiple characters) change dramatically (ex. you decide that instead of MC meeting character A at the beginning of act 1, MC should meet character A at the end of act 1 and now MC’s personality has taken a downswing).

What happened: You were relying too much on character A to guide your MC’s personality (a.k.a. MC isn’t developed enough to stand alone). 

How to fix it: Back to the drawing board (sort of). If your MC’s personality changes dramatically every time you move something around in the plot or their backstory, then you need to stop writing and aim your diligence at your MC. Basically, they just need to be fleshed out more. No more “their favorite color is green and they like rock music and they had their first kiss when they were 16.” That’s too surface, especially for an MC. If their personality isn’t pinned down for you yet, it’s time to start thinking about their backstory - and I mean all of it. When they were 4 and fell off their bike and scraped their knee, did they get back up or did they get scared and refuse to try again? Go through their life, bit by bit, thinking of anything that could shape their personality. If it helps to create a timeline, do so. If it helps to write it all out, do so. Anything to get you more centered on them. Once you have a good grasp of their backstory, their personality should be evident through how they responded to circumstances throughout their life. The takeaway here is: if moving things in your story affect your characters more than your plot, you have a character problem, not a plot problem.

Scenario 3: You’ve finished a couple drafts and you’re ready to go for a full rewrite, but your characters (who have spent an entire novel developing and persevering through the trials you’ve thrown at them), now want to start the book as developed as they ended (ex. MC who learned how to perfectly control their magic by the end of the book can’t seem to come to terms with the fact that they can’t use their magic very well at the beginning). 

What happened: You didn’t wait long enough before you started the rewrite.

How to fix it: Stop writing! Go read a book, or a whole series. Start writing a different wip. Take up a different hobby to fill the space this wip has created. Just don’t write!!! At this point, you should not be going back through for a rewrite until you’ve pretty much forgotten about your wip. Wait until the characters are a little further back in your mind - until you don’t remember every twist and turn you put in your story. Just don’t start your rewrite until you’ve forgotten how your characters behaved when it ended.

Every time you see this post on your dash, open up your WIP and write one sentence. It doesn’t matter if the sentence is good, makes sense or works perfectly with your story. You can go back to edit it later. 

Congrats, you made some progress on your WIP!

“Aw, look what happened. You’re a bad luck charm.”

“Someone tell me what’s going on because I have no idea what I’m looking at right now.”

“How’d you light that on fire? I didn’t even know that was possible.”

“Do me a favor and stop yelling into my ear, thanks.”

That’s Louis Rossman, a repair technician and YouTuber, who went viral recently for railing against Apple. Apple purposely charges a lot for repairs and you either have to pay up or buy a new device. That’s because Apple withholds necessary tools and information from outside repair shops. And to think, we were just so close to change.

Have an iPhone and are in need of repairs

Have a friend with that problem

Hate Apple and are more than happy to spite them in some way

So I asked the internet, well how hard IS it to repair? And I saw this guy’s video, and while I am no techie, I AM fueled by spite, so I was all “oh, they do that shit on purpose specifically so they can charge me $1200 bucks or make me buy a new computer hunh? FUCK THEM” and I bought all the tools I needed for about $25 and I bought all the parts I needed for about another $25 and I watched a few tutorial videos, and I replaced my own keyboard.

So, once you are doing the actual deed, it becomes pretty obvious that they are finding creative ways to make this much harder than it has to be on purpose. On thing that stood out to me is, instead of all the tiny screws being the same size, there are about two dozen very slightly different sizes. They could easily be all the same size, or like, two sizes at most, but no.

These mother fuckers will take a panel that screws into place and they’ll use a different size screw for each corner. They are so close that you almost cannot tell them apart visually, but they each will only screw into the matching corner. Like, it’s a pretty clear “fuck you” to anyone trying to do repairs.

Last time I talked about the differences between surprise and suspense, saying that we should actually try to use both in our writing. I don’t see enough articles that speak to how to write surprises and how to write them well. So I’ve broken down the element of surprise into five categories that may help.

1. Out of the Blue 

The out-of-the-blue surprise is what it sounds like–it comes out of the blue. It isn’t foreshadowed or expected in any way. In some ways, this can be the hardest surprise to pull off. Not because it’s difficult to write, but because if you do it wrong the audience will feel cheated or disappointed. One of the most important aspects of writing surprises is that the surprise isn’t a disappointment. You want to make sure it doesn’t undermine or cheat the reader. You don’t want that being the surprise. If the out-of-the-blue surprise isn’t a disappointment, it can be a fun one to throw into the story simply because the audience won’t be expecting it. For example, it could turn out in the story that the protagonist’s cousin and close friend is actually working with the antagonist. If this was not foreshadowed and the audience was not prepared for this revelation in any way, it’s an out-of-the-blue surprise. However, if your audience knows the cousin character well and this revelation seems to go against all that she is and what they believe of her, you run the risk of unbelievability. It may not sit well with them. In some cases, the audience may feel that the writer threw it in there for shock or in an effort to try to make the story more interesting. But, if the revelation comes and it fits the character in some way (though not foreshadowed), it will be a big surprise, and while shocking, will still be believable. The out-of-the-blue surprise is probably the easiest to write but the most difficult for the audience to accept.

2. Foreshadowed Surprise

A foreshadowed surprise is–yup, you guessed it–a surprise that has been foreshadowed. Now in order for it to actually be a surprise, you can’t be heavy-handed with the foreshadowing. When you are heavy-handed with the foreshadowing, the audience guesses the outcome before it happens, so it’s not actually a surprise. To be successful at this, the foreshadowing is there, but it’s subtle. If we use the example from the last section, we might give hints earlier in the story that the cousin character is working with the antagonist character, without actually revealing that fact outright, until the proper moment. When you subtly foreshadow, and then the surprise happens, the audience thinks back and says, “Oh yeah, that makes sense. I see that now.” A foreshadowed surprise takes a bit more skill to write, but it’s easier for the audience to accept, because it makes sense with what came prior. A good example of a foreshadowed surprise in Harry Potter is **spoiler** that Harry is a Horcrux. There is enough foreshadowing in the seven books, but it’s very subtle. So when we find out, it’s a big surprise, but it all fits.  

3. The Twist

People love a good twist. It’s almost its own thing. But in order to pull off a good twist, it needs an element of surprise. It belongs in the surprise, not suspense, category. I’ve talked about this in other posts, but a twist works off a shift in context. Sure, of course there is foreshadowing, but we actually move beyond subtle foreshadowing. We give the audience much more context for how to interpret the information they are receiving. Last time I mentioned the movie the Sixth Sense, which is famous because of its twist. In the Sixth Sense, the audience is given context for everything that is happening with and to Bruce Willis’s character. For example, the reason his wife won’t talk to him is because they’re having marriage problems. A twist shifts the context. The content is the same it’s been (i.e. Bruce Willis’s wife won’t talk to him), but our interpretation and understanding of it changes with new information or a new revelation about the information we already have (we find out Bruce Willis is dead). This is what makes a twist so powerful. The content was there in front of us the whole time. We had even interpreted it. But the reality was actually different than we’d assumed. A twist is probably the most difficult surprise to pull off, but it’s the easiest for the audience to believe–they’ve been staring at the evidence the whole time. They just didn’t see it that way. They may say things like, “I can’t believe Bruce Willis was dead!” But this comes from surprise and shock, rather than them disbelieving the story to be authentic. They have a hard time taking in the new information–it’s not that it ruins their suspension of disbelief, it’s that they are so surprised.

4. Exceeding Expectations

You can surprise your audience by exceeding expectations. You may have heard the concept that if you show a gun hanging on the wall in a story that that gun needs to go off by the end of the story (Chekhov’s gun). The audience expects the gun to go off. So you surprise them by not having it go off once, but three, four, five times at the end. That’s the simple way to explain it. Of course, there are other facets in play and things you can do wrong–I mean, if you are writing a cozy story, then having the gun go off and kill five people probably wouldn’t fit the tone. However, having it go off five times and hit other things, maybe even humorously, might work. But it’s the idea that you surprise the audience by moving beyond what they expect. You not only give them what they expect, but you take it much further to something they didn’t even imagine. That’s surprising.

5. The Trope Twist

If you aren’t familiar with the term “trope,” then I highly suggest checking out tvtropes.org, where you can learn more than you ever wanted to about them. A trope is a storytelling technique that has been used enough for the audience to recognize (consciously, or more often, subconsciously). It’s a pattern in storytelling. It can be about plot, character, story structure, and just about any number of things. For more about what at trope is, read this page.

Here are some quick examples:

Wake Up, Go to School, Save the World (Story type)

Tsundere (Character type)

Taking the Bullet (Micro-plot element)

It Sucks to be the Chosen One (Story/character element)

Be Yourself (Theme)

The Call Knows Where You Live (Plot element)

Basically, a trope is any thing that is done regularly in storytelling. Some people get a little disheartened learning and exploring tropes for the first time, because tropes may seem to oversimplify their amazing story (not to mention that tvtropes.org uses a witty tone in most all their entries (that is admittedly very entertaining)). But tropes aren’t bad, and every story has them. They’re only bad when they are handled poorly. And they get annoying if the same tropes seem to keep cropping up in the same ways. For example, after Harry Potter got big, I swear, almost every book had the prophecy trope in it. It was annoying.

That’s where surprises come in.

I bring up this example a lot, but one of the reasons I love Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn trilogy is because he took familiar tropes and twisted them in unexpected ways, so that even though we as the audience are familiar with the concept of “the chosen one,” we couldn’t guess the ways Brandon Sanderson ended up twisted them. So we were surprised.

When you twist a trope, you take something familiar to storytelling, and you do something atypical with it.

These work doubly well for writing twists in general. Because the audience knows the trope, they have an expectation (interpretation, context) already for the outcome in a story. But if you do something different, they’ll be surprised. They’ll say things like, “I didn’t see that coming.” Well, that’s because that trope usually doesn’t end that way. You, the writer, did something uncommon with it.

You can twist tropes in a number of ways. You can deviate from expectation. You can also move the expectation up, so that it happens and is dealt with much sooner than is typical. For example, “the chosen one” dies before Mistborn even starts. What a clever way to start a story. What happens when the supposed chosen one dies trying to defeat the ultimate villain? What’s next? When you read the back cover of Mistborn, it’s surprising. You can twist typical character roles. You can twist typical character tropes. You can twist typical plot outcomes.

When you mess around with tropes, you can come up with something surprising.

However, you can also, like the other surprises, end up with a worse story, if you don’t do it right. Which leads me to the next important point.

Where Surprises Go Wrong

Surprises work off doing something the audience doesn’t expect. But as I mentioned earlier, they can go wrong when that something is a disappointment or “lesser” than what is expected. The audience will feel cheated or shortchanged. You need to keep your promises to the audience. Whatever the surprise is, it should either be just as good as what the audience expected from the story, or better. Surprises can alter the overall outcome of the story. Or they add to the overall story. But they should not takeaway from the overall story. You don’t want to “cheat” the audience by promising them vanilla ice cream and then giving them broccoli by the end. You can surprise them by promising vanilla ice cream and then giving them chocolate ice cream instead (assuming they like chocolate as much as vanilla, so the exchange is equal). And you can surprise them by promising broccoli and then giving them ice cream instead (something they like even better). And you can surprise them by promising them broccoli, delivering that dish, and also vanilla and chocolate ice cream (exceeding expectations). But you should definitely not promise food and serve them nothing. (I understand that people will grumble different dissents to my metaphor because they don’t like ice cream or whatever the case, but it’s to illustrate my point, all right?) So, go forth and surprise me. Related Posts

So I started with going to the Sherlock (TV) section of Ao3. On the right we find this lovely section! ((I know I’m going over things you already probably know, but I figure this post may go to new Ao3 users, so bear with me.))

Underneath this, I chose sort by Kudos, because that’s a quick way to find most popular fics, for the sake of this demonstration. 

With those filters on, we end up with this being our first two results: 

As you can see, we have Nature and Nurture by earlgreytea68, and The Internet Is Not Just For Porn by cyerus. So what if I am utterly sick of seeing earlgreytea68 on my list? Let’s pretend I’ve read all their fics, or that I just don’t like her, or whatever. I want this author out. I go to this section on the right: 

In “Search within results” I type earlgreytea68 into the bar, with a minus sign in front. This gives me the following page, upon hitting the sort and filter button:

There goes earlgreytea68! But now I’ve decided that Crack is just not my thing, I’m sick of that, too, for heaven’s sake, I want something reasonable in my gay slash fanfiction about detectives that solve crimes about glowing dogs and irish megalomaniacs. Heaven forbid this get ridiculous.

Well, then I add this to my search:

Which gets rid of everything with that tag. My results are now:

Performance in a Leading Role is now my first result!

You can do this as many times as you want; the biggest problem I have is trying to filter out multi-worded tags. For example, “Secret Relationship” is hard to filter. Better to go with authors you dislike or with words like “DubCon”. 

I hope this helps! Also remember that googling site:archiveofourown.org and then adding search terms will mean google searches Ao3 for you, and sometimes that works far better. 

You can filter out phrases by enclosing them in quotes. For example, if ABO and Hydra Trash Party are not your things, try:

Say, you’re in your random fandom- I went with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, since I’ve been reading Iron Man stuff recently. Tony Stark is awesome.

But anyway, you’re on the page, and you see that there are 174,774 works! That is way too many for a casual afternoon’s browsing.

And you see that the first one is Peter Parker/Tony Stark and that is not your jam. It doesn’t work for you, or it squicks you, whatever. Wouldn’t life be easier if you could browse without seeing that pairing (or whatever pairing you don’t like)? You can!

First, click on that pairing tag(You may want to open this in another tab, actually.):

and it’ll take you to the page for that pairing tag. Click this button:

and then look at the address bar! The actual page is unimportant. Copy the numbers located here:

and go back to the original search page! Down on the side, in the same place you can get rid of other tags, type -relationship_ids:”the number you just copied”

Then hit ‘sort and filter’ annnd… magic!

The fics with that pairing are gone! You can also do multiple pairings, get rid of any tags you don’t like, and sort it by date or length or kudos, or whatever.

a character gets a sick burn and doesn’t realize it immediately, at some point later there’s just “HEY WAIT A MINUTE”

the double take. this one’s an oldie but a goodie

the injured character makes the killing shot that saves everyone else in a dangerous situation

a character who isn’t speaking is doing something weird in the background, it’s subtle and never acknowledged it’s just there for those who notice it (pulling another character out of something they got stuck in, making a huge sandwich, etc)

the beleaguered assistant inches away from smacking their boss

“quick act natural”

in that vein, the leader character was just in a shouting match with someone and when they come back the rest of the team scrambles to look like they weren’t listening at the door

Multiple characters banding together to lie about something 

Characters being split up for questioning

Really stoic characters briefly becoming happy, freaking everyone out

Hiya! In this post, I’m going to show you how to create a story-level character arc using the DCAST method. For a bonus printable workbook, head over to my Free Resource Library. Sound good? Super. Let’s get started.

Intro: Character arcs defined

So… what is a character arc? A character arc is the transformation, growth, or inner journey of a character over the course of a story. Character arcs are related to and tied up with plot arcs. Whereas plot arcs are about a character’s external journey (save the castle, get the girl, avoid prison); character arcs are about a character’s internal journey (fearful to courageous, shy to boisterous, miser to philanthropist).

Character-driven stories focus heavily on this internal arc, whereas plot-driven stories may only lightly touch on it, and that’s okay. Every story doesn’t need to be about a deep excavation of a character’s soul. But even plot-driven stories can benefit from incorporating character arcs.

Character arcs come in different shapes. They can be positive, negative, flat, ambiguous, bittersweet, or any combination.

Positive character arcs are the most familiar, since they are used so often in mainstream fiction and movies: Through a series of events, a character improves their situation and themselves. Examples: High Fidelity, Harry Potter, basically every mainstream book and movie

Negative character arcs are about characters who transform in an unsavory way by the end of the story. Example: Crime and Punishment

Flat arcs happen when a character encounters a series of obstacles and remains steadfast and unchanging, for better or for worse. Lolita, The Hunger Games

Ambiguous arcs are more common in literary stories. They present the reader the opportunity to interpret the arc for themselves—was it positive? Negative? Flat? Examples: The Road, We Have Always Lived in the Castle

Bittersweet arcs are similar to ambiguous arcs, except, well, they’re less ambiguous. In the end, the reader is clear what both the positive and negative aspects were, but feel that the positive outweighs the negative. Examples: The Fault in Our Stars, The Outsiders

Why character arcs are important

Good characters are essential to a good story. Imagine To Kill a Mockingbird without Scout; The Hunger Games without Katniss; Harry Potter without Harry, Ron, or Hermione; or Everything is Illuminated without Alex. This is not to minimize the importance of good plot. But a plot without good characters will fall flat.

That’s because readers don’t care about your plot by itself. They care about how your plot affects your characters. If your plot is full of crazy, exciting events but your characters are stiff, cardboard cut-outs who watch blankly from the sidelines as the story passes them by, your story will feel lopsided and unsatisfying.

That’s where character arcs come in. But, as you’ve probably figured out already, creating a character arc isn’t the easiest thing to do. I invented the DCAST method because I was frustrated and overwhelmed with all the “character development” sheets and checklists that were a mile long… but didn’t actually help me get to the heart of my character’s arc. Now, I’m able to get clear relatively quickly using the acronym DCAST to remind me of the most important character arc elements.

In this post, I’ll introduce you to the basics of creating a story-level arc for your character using the DCAST method. To apply this method to your own characters, get the companion download Creating Character Arcs: The Workbook over at my Free Resource Library.

How to plot a story-level character arc using the DCAST method

We’re going to look at giving your character an overall, story-level arc using the DCAST method. That means we’ll chart their internal development over the course of the entire story. They may have smaller arcs and changes within the story, but this top-level arc defines their overarching purpose and change (or lack thereof).

I stress this because often writers lose sight of the forest for the trees. They focus on all the smaller internal shifts their character goes through… and forget to define their character’s story-level journey. This can make for a story that lacks focus and drive.

Whew. Okay, I think we’re ready.

Sure, having a king/queen is simple, but have you ever tried:

Democracy

Multiple nobles and they all have the same amount of power (lot of conflict potential)

You can become ruler by defeating the current ruler in a fight

The merchants run everything

A noble and a parliament rule

The most intelligent people rule

…

Anarchy: the social conscience maintains order, but there are no laws

Athenian Democracy: Every citizen can vote on every new law

Representative Democracy: Elected representatives form a congress or government

Clan: Pretty much whoever is older is in charge, traditions are strongly adhered to, and society as a whole is split cross many tribes that are generally similar (and usually allied) but with their own quirks and traditions

Caste: A lot like a Clan structure, but each clan has a set role in society that usually renders them co-dependent. These Castes usually follow a social heirarchy

Dictatorship: One person controls everything, and they will later pass the right to rule to someone else, whether by inheritance, election, duelling, or some other method. Not all dictatorships are bad, especially if they are formed in times of crisis or rebellion, but even those started with the best intentions may quickly corrupt.

Plutocracy: Whoever has money is in charge.

Technocracy: A group of scientists and engineers have complete control and do everything they can to run the country at maximum efficiency. The more competent they are, the more likely this is to be viewed as a good thing.

Thaumocracy: Like a technocracy, but run by a science-like form of magic (like wizards and arcanists rather than shamans and witches)

Theocracy: The Church controls everything, and their religious law is civil law. Whether this religion is real, is fake but knows it, or believes its own lies is up to you.

Corporate State: Powerful mercantile organisations have taken control of entire regions. This is a lot like a Technocracy, but with a corporate structure and a focus on maximum profitability (and no-one else is going to set them a minimum wage)

Feudal: A lot like a dictatorship, but subsidiary lords are assigned their own local power and can enforce their own law without notifying the larger state.

***VARIATIONS***

Bureaucracy: Government runs very slowly and the public has effectively no control. There is a lot of red tape and taxation is high.

Colony: Government is dependent on a mother society

Cybercracy: A computer system is the state administrator. Hopefully the programmers did a good job…

Matriarchy: Positions of authority are female-exclusive.

Meritocracy: Positions of authority require rigorous testing to qualify for.

Military Government: The Military control everything, usually but not always totalitarian

Monarchy: The person in charge may call themselves king or queen, but fundamentally this is either a dictatorship or a feudal society.

Oligarchy: A small organisation is in control, and it elects its own members.

Patriarchy: like a matriarchy, but for guys. what a novel idea

Sanctuary: A society that protects the people other societies hunt (that may be considered criminals or terrorists by other nations)

Socialist: The government directly manages the economy, education is easy to get, the government intervenes to get everyone possible a job. This is likely to collapse quickly without good technology or magic to assist it.

Subjugated: The society as a whole is completely controlled by an outside force.

For those of you who have never taken a dip into the NaNoWriMo forums, here’s a little taste of what you’re missing! Today, we’re bringing you a Harry Potter-themed word crawl, slightly modified from the original created by NaNoWriMo participant “my little bird”. Can you navigate your first year at Hogwarts and boost your Camp NaNoWriMo word count?

You receive your Hogwarts letter by owl and are completely ecstatic to head out for your first year at Hogwarts. Sprint to 100 words to let out your excitement and energy.

Part 1: Diagon Alley

You arrive in Diagon Alley and your first stop is Gringotts, wizard bank. Write for ten minutes. The amount of words you write will determine how many Galleons are in your vault.

Less than 150 words: 1 Galleon 150-300 words: 2 Galleons More than 300 words: 3 Galleons

You step into Ollivander’s wand shop. What kind of wand will choose you? Roll a die and multiply your roll by 100. Sprint to that many words.

“It’s one of my distant likes. I still really like it when it comes up.”

And I just had to record it somewhere because I think it’s such a wise and simple way of expressing an important concept. Sometimes I feel like I’m neglecting an interest if I don’t do anything about it for a long period of time, like I can’t really say I like it if I don’t keep it up, but no, it’s just… it’s a distant like. That’s its own thing now.

Anyone with a name that starts with a “Z”, ends with an “i”, and isn’t some kind of Italian pasta, IS SERIOUS

- u cant stop. its a legitimate addiction. there is no ‘seeing what its like’. its soso hard to stop it and believe me, because that was me. i thought i would sate my curiosity but all i did was make my life miserable - everything can become a trigger. someone carved things in a table?? trigger. u get a scratch by accident?? trigger. see something sharp?? yup.  - the scars dont go away and if people see them (and no matter how hard you try, people will see them) they get this awful fucking look on their face like a mixture of disgust and horror and pity  - u have to sit through people making shitty fucking jokes and calling people like you (real, struggling people like you) edgy emos looking for attention and it makes you feel sick but you have to sit there silently - in fact, any conversation about self harm becomes thoroughly uncomfortable because they’ll talk about it like no one in the room has ever gone through it (or, if they know, they’ll glance at you out the corner of their eye when they think you cant see) - any emotion can give you the urges- not just negative. ur body associates the happy feeling with the pain so ur brain is like ‘????? u cant have one without the other??’  - it can have been years. years. you can have stopped and got better and you’ll still feel the urge to hurt yourself and it makes you feel like you haven’t improved at all and you’re still fourteen and hating yourself - (maybe this is just me) but some part of you misses it?? you stopped and you know its horrific but its so difficult to get rid of your blades or whatever you use because you feel so weirdly attached to these things that are so awful and you dont even know why 

Someone told my friend once, “I hope you are never comfortable a day in your life.”

My friend said that was the best advice she ever received. People told my friend her whole life that she was shy. So she started to believe it and make that her identity.

The day she started to believe that “shy was a lie” and started being confident in who God made her to be, that was the day everything changed. Shyness is not her identity, Jesus is.

She was never the same after that. If you met her in high school and saw her again now, you wouldn’t believe it. My friend is not shy - instead she’s the funniest person I know and she’s a joy to all those around her. She goes boldly after the things in her life.