Everyone is a Character

Every single person we meet in our lives is a character in our life story. While there might be several thousand people you come across in any given year, there are only so many basic types of personalities. Add life experiences, individual choices, and quirks, and boom! You have a diverse population.

I take pieces of different people who I’ve been fortunate enough to know and put them together to create my characters. I give them a basic personality, then they show me who they are through their experiences.

Some of the characters might go through things that I have gone through, or someone I know personally, or someone I’ve come across in a random crossing of paths. You may even notice some storylines in The Rideshare Chronicles that seem to closely mirror some of my personal experiences I’ve shared with you here on Ramblings.

That’s because we can only write what we know. Sure there are fantasies and circumstances that I’ve never personally experienced, but I know about them. Or I’ve heard something that took flight in my mind to come to a place that was entirely its own.

I’ve always been a fairly imaginative person. I used to make up stories to entertain my friends in elementary and middle school. I took extra creative writing classes in high school as electives. My mind is always dreaming up new stories, places, people, creatures, etc.

Have you ever taken part in people watching? If not, I’m sure you know someone who has. I create stories for people in my head. For example, if I’m at a stoplight and notice a few different groups of people standing around waiting to cross the street, I’ll make up stories for at least two or three or the entire group before the light changes.

I might imagine where they’re coming from, where they’re going, how they know each other, their relationship to each other, and what their futures might hold. It happens quickly. Sometimes I make myself laugh. (I may be crazy, who knows?)

All this life is, is our story. We are the main character. We get to choose what happens in our story. We may not choose when or how our story ends, but we get to choose everything in between.

We choose the supporting characters, our relationships with them, our scenes, our jobs, our hobbies, and everything else. If you don’t like what’s going on in your story, turn the page. Start a new chapter. Change directions. Every plot in your story doesn’t need to go through all the parts of your story. You get to choose all of that.

As for the characters in my novels, I give them life and then they reveal more of themselves to me. I have a loose idea of who they are and what their story or purpose is, but they take it from there.

I imagine the inside of my head to look like a little elf tree house with lots of fireplaces, wooden ladders leading from floor to floor, and tons of little elfs with tablets and quills running around creating stories.

At times they run into each other or squabble or over who’s idea is best for the story. It’s comical. I check in with them from time to time, particularly when I’m “stuck” while creating or when I’m attempting to fall asleep. (Again, I might be crazy.)

With all of that being said, my characters are figments of my imagination derived from my own experiences and interpretations, therefore any resemblance to any real life person is entirely coincidental. (That should cover my legal and civil responsibilities.)

Do you write or create stories? Even if you don’t, most people have some sort of creative outlet. Please share yours with me!