By Venita Bonds
Suppose
you’re perched in a tree watching trains hurtle toward each other on the same
track. You know they’re headed for a collision, but you can’t look away.
That
collision is what conflict does in fiction. While writers avoid conflict in our
own lives, we hurl our characters into disaster. Why? Because conflict forces
them to either change or crash.
Conflict
can be external or internal. External conflict puts pressure on a character while
internal conflict determines how she reacts. Let’s look at three forms of internal conflict and how each can
shape a character’s actions and responses to external conflict.
1.
Flaws and inner demons
Stephen Hawking said
that if everything were perfect, there would be no need for humans. I
would amend that to “no need for writers.” Readers dislike characters without
flaws or inner demons because they have little reason to struggle or change. Your
characters need to grapple with their imperfections while confronting external
obstacles.
Here, external conflict forces the character to respond,
while an inner demon complicates her choice: “She’s
asking me to help dump Leroy’s body. I should call the cops, yeah, but my steel
magnolia complex makes me stick by a friend even if it kills me.”
2.
Self-defense mechanisms
These mechanisms protect characters from anxiety, threats
to their self-esteem, and issues they’d rather ignore. Common
defenses include denial, rationalization, repression, projection, and
displacement.
For example, a character whose boss belittles him comes
home and yells at his son for burning up the biscuits. Unable to express his
anger toward his boss, he displaces it onto a safer target. Lashing out at the
boy gives him a temporary outlet for the humiliation he felt at work.
3.
False beliefs
A flat-Earther might see satellite images yet insist the planet
is flat. Characters rarely abandon beliefs that protect their sense of self; instead,
they find ways to defend them. Here are four ways they do it:
False memories and distortions. A character
reconstructs forgotten details, thereby distorting facts or creating false
memories that support what she already believes. For example, she remembers her
date walking out on her at the county fair, when in reality he was rushed to
the hospital with food poisoning. Years later, she vividly remembers his supposed
abandonment as proof that she was never worth caring about.
Motivated reasoning. Clinging to a false belief protects
a character from facing uncomfortable facts about herself. My neighbor dropped
out of school in eighth grade yet believes she can become a surgeon by watching
medical dramas on TV. Admitting she lacks the necessary education and training would
mean confronting the possibility that her dream may never come true.
Confirmation bias. A character supports a false
belief by seeking information that confirms it while ignoring evidence that
contradicts it. When my neighbor decided public education was a government
conspiracy, she turned to social media for confirmation. Finding “proof,” she began
home-schooling her kids using only a 1962 Collier’s Encyclopedia.
Cognitive dissonance. A character may double down on
a false belief rather than face painful self-examination or change. For
example, a businessman insists he’s generous yet refuses to help his ailing sister
pay a medical bill. He claims he’s teaching her independence rather than admitting
that his selfishness contradicts his view of himself as generous.
The positive side of the
negative
A character’s internal
conflict should shape the choices he makes. As he struggles with external
conflict, those decisions should challenge his beliefs, forcing him to grow, adapt,
and gain insight into others and his own
motivations.
Here, the character
recognizes his personal struggle, challenging his belief that he needs to hide
his own vulnerability: “I know how hard it is to smile and pretend the world ain’t
fixin’ to squish you like a dadgum bug. Is Mattie Jo secretly as scared as I’ve
been all my life? Can I help her if I shuck off my own mask?”
The takeaway
Put your characters on a collision course with disaster. Let their inner wounds and defenses hurtle them down the track. Your readers won’t be able to look away.
