100 Things You Should Know About Writing (Part 1)

11) How to Find and Use Character Motivation

Today we're getting into some seriously interesting territory. Although I'm both plot and character driven, I absolutely adore the aspects storytelling that involve my characters' internal landscapes. 

Motivation is (or should be) at the heart of what characters do and why they do them. 

Which means that, no matter what you planned for your story, if it's not going to make sense in terms of your your character's motivation, your best laid plans will go awry. Either your characters will revolt (if you're character driven), or you're going to find that readers just don't respond to the story right.

So what is motivation and why is it so important?  

I find in a lot of stories I critique that people think they've put some serious thought into their motivation, when in reality they haven't done half of the thought required. 

People tend to define character motivation as the reason why characters do what they do. 

However, there's actually a lot more to it than that. 

The way I look at it, motivation is the reason why, behind the reason why, behind the reason why a character does something. Furthermore, motivation causes the characters to do certain things.

For example. 

I recently read a question regarding plot points for a character who lost everything and therefore drank. 

Before I could answer, I needed to find out more about the character's motivation. So I asked: "Okay, but why is the character turning to drink?"

To which the answer was: "Because she lost everything and everyone she loves." 

Fair enough. However, that's not motivation. Looking at my definition, what we have is: She's drinking because she lost everything. 

Now is it only me, or does this feel a bit thin? Especially when you think the character needs to carry a whole book. 

"Because she lost everything" as motivation doesn't cut it. In fact, I'm pretty sure a lot of people after me shouted Cliche. (But I'll get to my thoughts on the subject of cliches in Section 27.) 

To get at the true motivation, you as the writer need to dig deeper. Sometimes, it helps to imagine it as a dialogue between you and the reader. 

Writer: So she turned to drink. 

Reader: Why? 

Writer: Because she lost everything. 

Reader: Yes. But why did that make her start drinking? 

Writer: Because she doesn't know how to live on without her loved ones. She prefers to live in the limbo drink takes her to, because at least then her pain is numbed. 

Reader: But why would she drink rather than do something like, say, seek revenge? 

Writer: Now that you mention it, she'd love to take revenge, but doesn't think she can because she always let her family fight her battles for her. So she never learned how to fight back. Now she drinks, because she thinks it's the only thing she can do. 

NOW we have something interesting. More often than not, it will also be unique to the character.

BUT! You do not outline every single step in your logic in an explanation in your first book. You only need to know a character's motivation so you can use it well and consistently.